Traditional Golf, Disc Golf to Collaborate

Local disc golfers will join traditional golfers Monday, Oct. 17, at Montecito Country Club for the fourth annual William Wiersma Golf and Disc Tournament, which benefits the William Wiersma Memorial Scholarship Endowment at Westmont. Golfers will tee off at 1 p.m., following a light lunch at noon. Hors d’ oeuvres will be served at 6 p.m., while awards and prizes are handed out. Greens fees are $150, $115 for recent college graduates (’06-’11) and $75 for current students. To register, please visit www.willstourney.com.

Wiersma graduated from Westmont in 2006 after spending his senior year studying at Oxford University. He was killed in a car accident in October 2006 while returning from an Ultimate Frisbee tournament in Phoenix. The following year, the Wiersmas established the scholarship to honor the principles of collaboration for which Will stood. This year, the tournament coincides with the fifth year reunion of Will’s graduating class.

Will’s parents, Tom and Laura, who live in Grand Rapids, Mich., and his sister, Natalie, say they are grateful that Montecito Country Club has embraced the unique approach of having both disc and stick golfers on one course.

“Traditional golf and disc golf don’t appear to have a lot in common, and the two aren’t usually played at the same time on the same course,” Tom Wiersma says. Bringing this unconventional version of fundraising to a conventional venue like Montecito Country Club seems like a near perfect marriage of innovation and collaboration.”