Fountain Park recently played host to a branch of the 2016 Professional Disc Golf Association (PDGA) Women’s Global Event, boasting competitions across the globe on May 14 to virtually compete across multiple age groups.

Several competitors in Fountain Hills earned global standing at the local event, with 32 ladies showing up for a day of disc golf.

The local event was called the May Flower open, with competitors as young as seven showing up to play two rounds of disc golf throughout the day on May 14. The temperatures soared above 100, but that didn’t seem to slow down the competition.

From Fountain Hills, placing third in the global junior division was 16-year-old Sequoia Hart. This is especially impressive, as Hart has only been playing the sport for the past four months.

Also representing local players well was Trina Lettig, who took sixth place in the global open masters division.

Finally, 13-year-old Azie Rogers took fifth globally. All three of these ladies won their division in the Fountain Hills event.

So, what does it mean to compete “globally” while only playing in Fountain Park?

The PDGA Women’s Global Event happens every two years and is a collaboration of smaller women’s disc golf tournaments run around the world. That makes this the largest PDGA event for a single demographic within the sport of disc golf. Back in 2014, the event hosted 1,060 women across 17 divisions, playing out of nearly a dozen countries.

This year, the record was broken with more than 1,600 women competing out of 11 countries.

With results combined from all of these events, participants quickly find out how they fared against the local competition, as well as players of a similar skill level across the world.

In Fountain Hills, the May Flower Open was presented by Plaza Fountainside and both rounds of play were back to back on the highly regarded Fountain Park course. The awards ceremony followed at Euro Pizza Café.

One of the major focuses of this event is to encourage more women to get out and get involved in the sport of disc golf. According to one of the organizers, Tonya Hunter, additional steps were taken for the local tournament to make it as inviting as possible.

“We charged these ladies only $5 to register for the event, compared to the normal $50-$100 for these types of tournaments to encourage growing the sport,” Hunter said. “That meant a full-time job fundraising for sponsors and that went very well. So much support, sponsorship and donations from all over helped us raise the money we needed to make it amazing for everyone.”

Hunter also served as representation from the local Fountain Hills Disc Golf Club, which is helping to promote the sport od disc golf around town and beyond. More event on the group can be found at discgolf.club.

As an added bonus, the May Flower Open provided fundraising for the global charity, Right to Play. This organization uses the “transformative power of play” to educate and empower children facing adversity. More information can be found at rightoplay.com.

Finally, additional information on the Women’s Global Event, including international results, can be found online at pdga.com/women/global-event.