Fat Ninja

They were out of hot pink, so I went with red.

I figured I’d take a stab at offering up some amateur attempts at reviewing some of the disc golf products that I use. To start, I’ll offer you my impressions of my current driver of choice, the Innova Star Valkyrie. The Valkyrie is my only disc from Innova’s Star line. I’ve used all of their plastics, and I have to say that the Star line is a beautiful mix of the best elements from each of the other high-end plastic lines, taking the smooth grip of the Pro line and combining it with the durability of the Champion line.

As for the performance of the disc itself, you should know a few things about my style of play, just so that you understand why I’m getting the results I’m getting. I’m a right-handed player and I throw side-arm. My backhand is pretty weak, but I can tell you in passing that the Valkyrie, when thrown backhand, has proven to be a solid, straight flyer; but, like I said, I’m inexperienced at throwing backhand, so I haven’t seen its full potential.

You should also know that I’m using a 150-gram Valkyrie, which is about 20 to 24-grams lighter than most of my other discs. I went with a low weight on the Valkyrie to try and work on my technique. As a result of this lower weight, my initial impressions of the Valkyrie were pretty poor. Fortunately, I stuck with it long enough to realize that my frustrations were stemming from a combination of the disc’s lower weight and the fact that I was used to my understable Archangel.

Once I became award of these facts, I worked on approaching throws with an emphasis on finesse rather than raw power. My first step was to try and let my wrist provide a bit more of the torque by snapping it at release. While this certainly gave a bit more predicatbility to my throw, I was still running into a lot of issues with the disc turning over on me. Once more, I became frustrated and “retired” the Valkyrie for a bit.

This guy, Christian Sandstrom, holds the record for longest drive at 250 meters. It was with a Valkyrie

But recently I decided to try it out once more, to see if there was something I could do to correct the issue, and I’ve managed to actually get it to the point where the Valkyrie has become my preferred driver. By putting an anhyzer angle on it from the start of my throw through the release, I’ve managed to counteract the disc’s tendencies to turn over on me. The result is a nice, fairly accurate helix shot that covers a pretty decent amount of distance.

FINAL THOUGHTS
The Star Valkyrie is quickly becoming my primary driver. Stability issues that I’ve run into with it honestly have had more to do with technique issues on my side. I think with time I’ll be able to further perfect my technique so that I can really start capitalizing on what is truly a great driver.

OVERALL RATING: Birdie

MY DISC RATINGS EXPLAINED
ACE = Exceptional
BIRDIE = Above average
PAR = Average
BOGIE = Sub-Par

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