World Championships 1999
Rochester, New York, July-Aug 1999

Ken Climos 9 year reign as Disc Golf World Champion came to an end last Saturday when Ron Russell beat him by 4 shots at the end of 171 holes of golf and a total of 432 shots. He won 4000 USD. Ron Russell entered the final round with a four-stroke lead over nine defending champion Climo. Climo managed to make up one of the strokes during the morning round and they entered the final safari nine with Russell ahead by three. Three strokes ahead with only nine holes to go may have sounded like a big cushion... but nothing is comortable when you are trying to stave off the most dominant golfer our sport has ever seen. Russell kept his wits about him and played outstanding golf. He shot one better than Climo during the finals to push his margin of victory back up to four strokes and become the new disc golf World Champion. Congratulations to Ron! Juliana Bower easily retained her title as Womens World Champion with a total of 510 shots. Top non-USA performer was Jesper Lundmark of Sweden in 6th place. Six other Swedes and one Fin made it to the semi final round and finished in the top 50. Britain's Simon Luard finished in 152nd place out of 173 finishers in the Open division. The masters division (35+) was won by Jim Oates after a play-off with Stan McDaniel, they shot 457.