An upgrade to the Elite Series for the Cascade Challenge
May 14, 2025 by Justin Westfall in Preview
Coming off the first Major of the year, the Disc Golf Pro Tour resumes in Shelton, Washington, this week for Discraft’s Cascade Challenge. Similar to last month’s KC Wide Open, the Cascade Challenge has held a spot on the former DGPT Silver Series and the Q-series before getting the call up to the Elite Series for 2025. Many of the European players will be notably absent this week including world #1 Kristin Lätt. Reigning MPO champion Niklas Anttila will be one of the few Europeans in the field.
Unlike Anttila, reigning FPO champion Deann Carey will not be in the field this week. The event will once again be played at Shelton Springs just southwest of Seattle.
Past Winners
| Year | PDGA Tier | MPO Winner | FPO Winner |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | A | Niklas Anttila | Deann Carey |
| 2023 | DGPT Silver | Ricky Wysocki | Kat Mertsch |
Four Things We’ll Be Watching
1. Fresh off her second career Major victory, Missy Gannon will look to keep things rolling this weekend: her game shapes up well for technical courses like Shelton Springs. While Missy tends to go through hot and cold streaks throughout a season, she actually has not won back-to-back events since the end of the 2021 season, when she won the Throw Pink Women’s Disc Golf Championship and DGPT Championship in consecutive weeks. She’ll have a great opportunity to break that drought this weekend and claim her 11th career DGPT win.
2. The above also goes for MPO Champions Cup winner Isaac Robinson. In his four previous Elite and Major wins, Robinson has never gone back-to-back, though he does have two runner-up finishes in events following wins. Shelton Springs obviously suits Robinson’s game as he looks for just his second career DGPT win and first in nearly three years. While his brother Ezra might seem like a good pick for this track as well, he has struggled somewhat since his win at the Supreme Flight Open to begin the season. Averaging a 1038 rating since that event, Ezra could really use a bounce back weekend in Shelton.
3. Speaking of players looking for a bounceback, 2023 Cascade Challenge champion Kat Mertsch has no podium finishes this season and has not cracked the top 5 since the SFO. And yet, Mertsch has averaged a 983 event rating so far this season. That’s 7 points above her new career-high player rating, a testament to how the level of FPO disc golf has risen in recent years. Kat has only averaged over a 1000 rating once in her career, and that’s quickly become a mark that can be eclipsed without guaranteeing a win. Just ask Ella Hansen, who averaged a career-high 1007 rating in Kansas City last month to finish in 3rd. While she’s known for big distance, Hansen is a terrific woods player and will be very close to her home in Seattle this weekend. This could be a great opportunity for the SFO champion to claim a second title this season.
4. Reigning MPO champion Niklas Anttila will be looking for his third DGPT title in a row this weekend. Anttila skipped last month’s KC Wide Open following back-to-back wins at the Open at Austin and Music City Open. During this past off week, Anttila lost in a playoff to Gannon Buhr at the Santa Cruz Masters Cup. A repeat win in Shelton would not only be a huge lift following that loss, but would catapult him to the front of the Player of the Year conversation. On the other hand, 2023 Cascade winner Ricky Wysocki is still searching for his first win as a Discraft athlete and should be well-positioned this weekend. Wysocki is one of the best scramblers the sport has ever seen, giving him a leg up on courses like Shelton Springs. In his 2023 win on this course, Wysocki converted 86% of his scramble attempts and carded just two bogeys. This season, however, Wysocki is 13th in the division in scramble rate, converting at 51.6%. Last year, he led the MPO division at 63.1%.
The Course
Nestled just outside of the Olympic National Forest, Shelton Springs is a mostly wooded course that occasionally plays out into more open areas among the surrounding power lines. Known as Christmastown, USA, for the large number of douglas fir trees grown in Shelton, fans will notice a plethora of tall firs throughout the course. This track requires high precision placement shots and strong scrambling abilities. The layout has been lengthened substantially over the past two years and will feature several new holes for 2025.
2025 MPO: 9,728 Feet Par 64
2023 MPO: 8,219 Feet Par 61
2025 FPO: 8,201 Feet Par 65
2023 FPO: 7,285 Feet Par 61
Extended Forecast
There will be a fair amount of clouds and rain in the forecast as you might expect for the region. Conditions should clear up a bit for the final round on Sunday.
Friday: Cloudy with occasional rain showers, highs in the upper 50s. Winds 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
Saturday: Cloudy with showers, highs in the lower 60s. Winds 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
Sunday: Sun in the morning with clouds in the afternoon, highs in the mid 60s. Winds 10 to 15 mph.
