A few weeks back I wrote a disc golf analysis article on the Bag Average Stability (BAS) metric. That was a measure of the average stability of all the discs in your bag intended to help you determine if throwing more stable discs overall may increase the consistency of your game. Near the end of the article I made a strong point that calculating your BAS is pointless if you include discs that you never throw. So as a follow up to that article I’m introducing the disc golf metric of Throw Average Stability (TAS).
Throw Average Stability (TAS) is similar to the BAS metric, except that it’s a weighted calculation that takes into account discs you throw more or less often. In BAS each disc is only counted once, but in TAS the disc is counted each time you throw it. The clear advantage of using this calculation is that it’s a much more accurate representation of the average stability that you actually throw.
The primary disadvantage to this is that gathering the data for the metric takes much more effort. A secondary disadvantage to TAS is that it’s difficult to compare across different courses. Different courses require different shots, and if courses call for different distances or flight paths then you’re simply not comparing apples to apples. It’s best to establish a benchmark TAS for each course that you regularly play (like I mentioned this takes a lot more effort).
I recently calculated my TAS while playing Burchfield Park in Holt, Michigan (long tees to long baskets). My Throw Average Stability was 40, compare that to my Bag Average Stability of 32. I tend to reach for my Crush and M1 more than any other discs which weights the average to a higher overall stability. This should display how TAS is more accurate that BAS. This simple table displays my setup for the TAS calculation. I did not include anything inside 75 feet since putting is so different and I cut out many of the rows just so the table didn’t take up too much space.
Personally, I’ve increased my TAS over time because I know that this is strongly correlated with my consistency. I did, however, mention in the last article that I often see fewer birdies as I take safer shots, but I also see far few above par holes. As a result my scores are much more consistent.
One specific change I’ve made is throwing more sidearm hyzers with stable discs instead of long backhand anhyzers with understable discs. I’ll work to improve on my backhand anhyzers, but until I’m more comfortable throwing those I often chose a shorter but safer sidearm shot. I also predict that my TAS will actually decrease at some point as my new discs break in and I become better with those anhyzers. This should emphasize the point I made in the Bag Average Stability article, use TAS as a metric to help analyze your disc golf game but don’t throw discs just for the sake of influencing your TAS.
As winter is approaching I probably won’t use TAS for a while since I change my bag entirely for cold and snow, but watch for more disc golf analysis articles in the future. In the mean time, calculate your own TAS for a couple courses and let us know what you find, and share this article with your fellow disc golfers who are working on getting better!
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