How to tackle the wet conditions

Its officially hit the point in Western Pennsylvania, where it’s either a day of raining or sprinkling. That makes it incredibly difficult to do anything as far as videos outside, course reviews or league grounds. A better part of the time we are just pushing through and getting some rounds in, with the only sign of hope being chalk bags and towels.

I think the biggest takeaway from this time of year is that even though you were at your peak performance or closer to it, your mental games really will get challenged. From slipping on shots, bad grip, the thought of getting delayed or not, and that’s all before the mention of physically feeling heavier with the water and that sense of control being gone.

I figured this would be a good time to talk about what I do to keep myself mentally sharp, and focused so I can perform to my best each and every day.

First and foremost, I think just from years of playing in what conditions the hardest thing to get over is wet feet and wet hands. The feet? I’ve tried a ton of different waterproof shoes and it’s nice for my feet to be dry, but I also get uncomfortably hot in fully waterproof shoes. So I prefer water resistant so there’s still some breathability to it and I just deal with wet feet.

Getting into wet, hands and discs I think chalk bags or what is giving me the most success with keeping my hands dry and keeping grip consistent, but there is a fine line between overly dry and almost tacky versus a good Hand feel. I do my best to dry the disc off with a dry towel and also dry my hands with that towel before I use chalk. I think I’m also fairly fortunate with not being a forehand dominant player that I can almost go fully backhand on most courses that I play. This gives me that extra touch of confidence, because fore hands tend to slip out easier than back hands just for a lack of points of contact. I also find it much more advantageous to use a fan grip in what conditions, especially when I’m throwing slower discs because there’s tends to be more control. I also stray away from anything really above 10 speeds for the same reason.

When we look at the rest of the mental game of being throwing your shots and having expectations of where they’re going, you need to realize that everything is going to skip more when it’s wet. Also count for the fact that most shots you’re not going to be throwing perfectly with the same tempo and control that you normally do, so you need to be OK with slightly longer up shots or longer pots and not let that affect you mentally. What keeps me sharp in those moments is the fact that I can rely on my putting way more often than not. It might be controversial, but I don’t think that putting gets all that affected, maybe you lose a couple feet of distance but I think that’s it.

Look at footwork when it’s wet, I tend to think of it like you’re playing in the snow. They’re gonna be times when you have very, very good traction, but also times when you can’t buy a firm foot placement. This brings up a bigger general point of make sure you have a practice routine that suits you, but I will put the claws in that you also need to practice a run up even if that means at 25% speed. Something you see very infrequently with high-level players, our shots where their feet are not under control or they slip. All of our power comes from that brace of your front foot and if you don’t have that foot firmly planted you’re losing fire and control.

As a little sidenote, since they seem to always go hand-in-hand, the leaves are gonna start falling if they haven’t already around you and finding discs can be kind of tricky. I’d love to say that I have an easy trick for this, but outside of doing something with a ribbon on the bottom of your disc or just paying very good attention, you’re probably gonna spend some time looking for your shots. I will make the exception of that of being that if you throw the most neon discs, it does make it somewhat easier.

I wish there was more than I could tell you about how to be successful when it’s raining, but in the grand scheme of things, you’re still just playing this sport that you love at the highest level you can. So if you have some other tips or tricks that you normally use I’d love to hear about them and I bet you the community would too.

Go get after it today,

Jake