This April will see some of Hilton Head Island’s storied golf links greeting competitors from around the world in a tournament that blends explosive matchups of skilled athletes with a carnival atmosphere of laid-back fun. From the opening drive to the final putt, this will be a tourney like few others, one that the players look forward to all year long.
It all culminates when the Union Cemetery second annual Disc Golf Open tees off April 25.
Wait, what tournament did you think we were talking about?
This is disc golf, golf’s cool younger cousin.
Brandon Beat concentrates as he attempts to make par with a shot through the trees.
“Back in 2020 during COVID, that’s when disc golf itself had a big boom, because it was a sport where people could still distance themselves and get outside. It was one of the few sports that flourished while team sports fell off,” said Brandon Beat, founder of Broad Creek Disc Golf Club.
Heading out into the rustic fairways of the Union Cemetary course, known affectionately as The Graveyard, it’s easy to see the appeal. If pickleball was able to carve out a niche among tennis players who were looking for something a little less physically taxing, it also laid out a blueprint that disc golf could follow. The joy of golf is there – getting out into beautiful scenery, balancing the strategy of an approach shot with the raw power of a drive, spending time with friends.
“When a ball dreams, it dreams it is a frisbee.”
But with disc golf, all the things that keep some people away from golf simply aren’t there.
For one, it’s a lot easier on the back. While more advanced players will tee off with a gymnastic display of whip-cracking limbs designed to add that little extra oomph to their throw, you can hold your own on the course simply tossing the disc as you would to a dog. Second, it’s a lot cheaper. The guys who come to The Graveyard every Sunday show up strapped with hundreds of dollars’ worth of different discs for different shots, but new players can get away with simply dropping $30 or so on a driver, wedge, and putter disc.
Perhaps most importantly, the culture around disc golf is entirely more inviting than around golf.
Anyone who’s been in a competitive foursome knows that smack talk is as much a part of the game as putting. In disc golf, that simply disappears. The protocol on the links here is cooperation – urging each other on, presenting pointers as helpful suggestions rather than criticism, and pitching in when, for example, someone launches their disc into a lagoon.
Scott Keith tees off on Hole #5 of the Union Cemetary Course.
That’s evident in their traditions.
“Something disc golfers have always done, going back to the ’70s, is before the round starts and before you play the last hole you do a little fist bump and share a ‘Nice round,’” Beat said.
Beat found himself missing that camaraderie after moving to the Lowcountry in 2016. An avid disc golfer for years, he was drawn back into the sport when a few locals let him join their trip out to Tom Triplett Park Disc Golf Course in Pooler, Georgia.
“The bug just got me again,” he said. “I started thinking we need to get something going on Hilton Head.”
Roby Bregar and Brandon Beat were two early disc golf enthusiasts in the area.
Joining him on that trip was Roby Breger, an old friend who had been resisting for years Beat’s attempts to get him out on the course.
“I had just quit drinking and was sitting on the couch at my dad’s house thinking, ‘Gee, I really wish somebody would call me to do something other than go out and drink,” Breger said. “No kidding, Brandon called me five minutes later.”
Breger was hooked immediately. Not only did he and Beat begin feeling out other disc golfers to form a club, Breger played on the amateur circuit, playing in 46 tournaments in 2022 alone on his way to being named state champion for the state of South Carolina. He would soon be joined by dozens of others, who meet every week at The Graveyard for a round they call Sunday Funday.
“I had free time and knew Brandon Beat, so I just started coming out,” said Julie Miles, the sole female disc golfer on a recent Sunday. “Everyone’s so nice, and it really is like a big family. I usually play the shorter tees, but [sometimes] I play from the longer tees because it’s a little more challenging for me.”
Brandon Beat’s disc marker features a photo of his brand new baby girl.
The club has also crossed generations, bringing the father-and-son duo of Branden and Emory Denham out to test each other on the links.
“We were trying to find something to bond over. Well, he was,” said Branden, with a laugh at his dad. “And we never stopped. It’s always competitive. He’s rated 901 and I’m rated 905 so it’s pretty evenly matched.”
The club began their weekly rounds at Hover Links, the course behind First Presbyterian Church. Having found the course in rough shape, first from Hurricane Matthew debris and then years of neglect, Beat personally helped bring it back to life, removing debris and even cutting down trees that had grown through the chains of the holes. It was a good spot until post-COVID attendance at the church began to grow, squeezing the disc golfers out of the parking lot.
The group quickly realized they needed their own home links and saw opportunity in the mid-island tract. The former site of Planter’s Row Golf Course before it was bought by the town and turned into a park, it provided the perfect place for the club to call home.
Father and son, Branden and Emory Denham, enjoy bonding over a game of disc golf a few times a month.
“When I brought disc golf to (the Town), they were looking at the property across the street at Ashton Tract,” said Beat. “We showed you don’t need to cut down trees and do all that work when you have a beautiful property like this.”
The town agreed, and the club got another powerful ally when the Island Rec Center got involved.
Julie Miles, Brandan Denham. Emory Denham, Lizardi “Speedy” Roblero, Roby Breger, Craig Ryan, Sean McCaughn, Chas Brooks, Scott Keith, Brandon Beat, Skylar Jewell, Josh Redmond, Alex Tye, Amir Allan and Alec Razete
“This started when Nathan Skager was in charge,” said Katherine Vicars, who replaced Skager as director of outdoor recreation for Island Rec. “We had access to the mid-island tract, where we were doing archery lessons and things out there, so we bought some baskets and set up 6 to 8 holes for camps or after school.”
The Rec Center and Broad Creek Disc Golf Club worked hand in hand to carve out the beautiful eighteen-hole course that winds throughout the tract, maintained by the members – like Keith Jackson, who can often be found zipping around the course on his golf cart. Like the sport itself, the entire course runs on a friendly sense of camaraderie.
Now, what started as a few hobbyists getting together has grown into a tight-knit crew who all share in the love of the game, and in the excitement of seeing it flourish on an island long dominated by that other kind of golf.
Want in? Check out Broad Creek Disc Golf on Facebook.
Roby Breger makes a tee shot at Union Cemetary, one of the disc golf courses on Hilton Head Island.
