Is DeLaveaga one of the most difficult courses on the planet? It absolutely is. Want proof? Look no further than the results from Round 1 of the 2015 “Steady” Ed Memorial Masters Cup.

How many throws under par did someone need to be to finish with a rating of 1000+? Trick question. DeLa is so punishing that even though a majority of the top players in the world played the course today in near-perfect conditions, a final score of one OVER par was rated 1001, unofficially.

Despite the challenges that DeLaveaga provides, there are always a handful of competitors that are able to conquer it. Patrick Brown #25713, playing in the Open Masters division, ended up turning in the hot round for the day, carding 11 birdies and one bogey for a final score of 62, 10 under par. There were still dozens of cards in the Open division that had yet to finish when Brown completed his round but as more and more scores came in it became obvious that 10 under par was going to be tough to beat.

We caught up with Patrick, while he was waiting for the other players on the card to throw their approach shots on hole 16. His drive was already parked for birdie, and it became obvious pretty quickly that he was having one of those days where everything was going right. By this point he had already carded birdies on some of the more difficult holes on the front half of the course, including an extremely impressive birdie on Hole 11, a tree-plagued 370’ tunnel shot with a narrow fairway, low ceiling, and OB road on the right, pictured below.

Patrick will tee off tomorrow morning at 10:10am PDT on a quest for his second Masters Cup win in row, joined by Chris Brophy #13274, Jason Tyra #9010, and Santa Cruz’s own Jonathan Baldwin #18114. Patrick holds a lead of six over Brophy, with Tyra and Baldwin two more throws behind, locked in a tie for third place.

Several players in the Open division started out on pace to turn in a better score than Patrick, but eventually DeLa got the best of them. Paul McBeth #27523 and Nate Doss #11794 finished the day tied for the lead at nine under par after taking birdies on the final hole, a 550’ downhill throw dubbed “Top of the World” by the locals. Gregg Barsby #15857 sits alone in third place at eight under par with Simon Lizotte #8332 and Jeremy Koling #33705 tied for fourth a seven under par.

In the Open Women’s division, Val Jenkins #17495 and Catrina Allen #44184 played on the same card and ended up finishing with the same score, four over par. Their unofficially 981 rated rounds were good enough to put them at the top of the leaderboard, with another pair of equal scores joining them on the lead card tomorrow.

In a similar fashion as Val and Cat, Paige Pierce #29190 and Jessica Weese #50656 also played on the same card this morning, and finished with the same score of six over par, just two throws behind the leaders. Beyond tomorrow’s lead card there are an abundance of women within a few strokes of each other ready to take on DeLa again tomorrow afternoon with the hopes of making a move towards the top.

The Open Women are the last division to tee off for Round 2, with the lead card tee time set to 2:00pm PDT. The Open division’s lead card tees off one hour earlier at 1:00pm PDT. Tune in tomorrow for live hole-by-hole scores including tweets via @pdgalive on Twitter. High-resolution pictures from the day are already available on the PDGA Flickr page and videos will be available in the morning from The Disc Golf Guy, Central Coast Disc Golf, and Prodigy Disc. Another day of 2015 “Steady” Ed Memorial Masters Cup action is coming soon. Don’t miss out, and if you’re one of the players, don’t get DeLa’d!