Disc golf proves more than a hobby for Tribal member

By Nicole Montesano

Smoke Signals staff writer

A game that began as an escape and a lifeline for Tribal member Highpine Eastman has become a cherished hobby – one that is slowly filling his shelves with trophies.

Eastman has become a disc golf devotee, and he is working his way up the ranks of the sport, attending multiple competitions every summer.

Eastman didn’t foresee this happening; he just wanted to get out of his apartment for a while.

He was living in Fairview, near his ancestral Chinookan homeland in 2019 and struggling with alcohol addiction.

That same year, Eastman said, he found the Native American Rehabilitation Association.

“I started going to NARA in 2019, on my sober Red Road journey,” he said. “It was such a good help to me; I was learning a lot of things that trigger me, people places and things … NARA gave me everything that I needed.”

Still, Eastman said, “It was very depressing being stuck in a two-bedroom apartment.” So, Eastman began visiting the nearby Blue Lake Disc Golf Park.

“I kind of just wanted to get out of the house, was my angle, and I just started walking and throwing the disc,” he recalled. “After three hours, I was done walking the course and it took so much of my mind, my focus … instead of being in the apartment, thinking about my addiction, it got me out of the house and just learning how to throw this crazy disc.”

He began visiting regularly, continuing to work on his throwing skills and eventually began buying his own discs.

“It’s a cheap sport; you just have to buy the discs for $10 to $15 each and you can go play for free at the park,” he said.

“They start becoming valuable to you and you start liking them, and you start throwing them really well. So, I’ve learned a lot from when I first started throwing them. I was throwing with my first two fingers and my thumb. After a couple of years, I started going on YouTube, looking at tutorials. I learned I was grabbing the disc wrong; not holding it with four fingers. When I started doing that, I got another 100 feet in a throw. Power grip, it was called.”

Eastman moved to Grand Ronde in 2020, but he said he’s been disappointed in the lack of local disc golf courses. For a while, he said, after he wrote and suggested one, the Tribe had a course at the old powwow grounds on campus, but it removed most of the campus baskets.

Tribal Parks and Recreation Coordinator Jerry Bailey said a few baskets remain on the main campus, “with most being behind the main campus education buildings.

“We are looking at a new layout for the baskets down there, but are still in the planning stages,” Bailey said.

In 2021, the Tribe installed a course behind the Plankhouse, east of uyxat Powwow Grounds next to Fort Yamhill State Park. Eastman said he doesn’t use the course at that one much, because it feels less safe to him. Since he tends to practice alone, he said, he’s concerned about wildlife, such as cougars.

But he said he continues to enjoy competing in the sport, racking up a trophy most recently in September at the Oregon Coast Championship, where he took first place in the 40- to 50-year-old bracket. Having met his goal to advance out of the mixed amateur three division, and then to place his average ratings above 900, Eastman said, he’s now setting himself a new goal: To achieve a round rated at 1,000 or better.

There were 423 players with a 1000-plus rating who qualified as PDGA Premier Pros for 2024, the last year full statistics were available from the Professional Disc Golf Association.