Birdies for Brock had its biggest year yet.
110 golfers. 28 teams. A full shotgun start at Echo Falls. And by the time the last group walked off 18 and the scores were final, the tournament had donated $50,000 to Melodic Caring Project — the largest single-year donation in the event's five-year history. That brings the total given to MCP under this tournament's banner to over $100,000.
Who Brock was, and what this tournament is for
It seems that when tragedy strikes, and someone loses their life, the deceased are almost always remembered as the best of us. Brock Gates was truly a 1 of 1 individual and his absence continues to be felt by all who were fortunate enough to be in his circle. Brock passed away from leukemia on March 13, 2022, and Birdies for Brock started shortly after — one of his childhood friends launched it as a way to help his wife, Larissa, and the family. In year two, Elise Brueske took it over. Elise had a background in corporate executive marketing and events, she was close to Brock and Larissa, and she wanted to give the tournament the structure and reach it deserved.
She also wanted to give it a mission. After talking with several nonprofits, she chose Melodic Caring Project — a Seattle-based organization that brings mental health support, music therapy, and live-streamed concerts to kids in hospitals and to families in isolation during long treatment stretches. The choice was intentional: Brock loved music, and MCP's work reflects what mattered to him.
Every dollar the tournament raises now goes to MCP. Elise later joined their board.
The tournament this year
Fifth year. Biggest field. Biggest donation.
The numbers, plainly:
- 110 golfers, 28 teams (a few threesomes rounded out the field)
- $50,000 donated to MCP this year alone
- Over $100,000 total given to MCP under the tournament's five-year run
- 28 sponsors across hole signs, prizes, and event underwriting
- Format: scramble, gross, shotgun start at Echo Falls Golf Club in Snohomish, Washington
Elise runs this event alongside her work with MCP. It has grown every year, which is not something you can automate. It grows because someone is doing the work — recruiting sponsors, chasing details and registrations, keeping the mission at the center. This year was a step up in size and a step up in outcome.
How the day ran
Elise had used two other tournament platforms in prior years — Golf Genius the first two years, and Live Tourney last year. This year was her first with ForeBoard. Her verdict, comparing it directly to the two platforms she'd used before: "I liked it better than all of them."
Asked how she felt the night before, on a one-to-ten scale: "Ten. I felt zero concerns at all. This is honestly the best I've felt going into a tournament in terms of how I felt our scoring platform was going to work."
Registration was smooth. Every team got a printed cart card with a QR code and a starting hole. Team captains also received a personal email with their QR code — a bulk-send flow Elise flagged specifically:
"The way it's laid out, where it pulls up every team name and I can just copy and paste an email address for each captain and then send it — one click, one button — that was like the highlight of my life. That probably saved me 30 minutes, maybe longer."
Players scanned, opened the leaderboard on their phone browser, and started scoring. No downloads. No accounts. No paper backup needed.
Of the 28 team scoring links that went out that morning, all 28 came back live. Zero teams needed a paper card. Zero teams needed to be chased down for their scores. Zero organizer nudges were sent all day.
Two groups didn't start entering scores until an hour into the round — they back-filled seven holes in a single burst, then finished on time with the rest of the field. Nobody had to reconstruct their card afterward. Nobody at the scoring tent had to catch it.
In Elise's words
"I was blown away by how intuitive ForeBoard was, both from a tournament director's perspective and for the golfers using it. The ability to easily build teams, import players, generate team cart cards, and bulk-send individual QR codes to foursome captains was a huge time saver. Having the organizer guide right there when I had questions was incredibly helpful, and the live tournament feed was a hot gathering spot following the tournament. I've also received great feedback from our players about how easy ForeBoard was to use throughout the tournament. There are even features I didn't have time to use this year — like team messaging — that I'm already excited to incorporate next year!"
— Elise Brueske, Tournament Director, Birdies for Brock
The point of a tournament like this
Every August, a group of people who cared about Brock — and a growing circle of people who never met him — spend a Thursday on a golf course together. They raise money for a nonprofit that helps kids get through treatment they didn't ask for. They tell stories. Someone gives a speech. Somebody wins closest-to-pin. Nobody wins something more important than what everyone showed up for.
Asked how she wanted the tournament and Brock represented, Elise said this:
"Brock was a champion for people taking risks. If they had an idea or a dream, he was such an encourager — 'Don't wait, just do it, just figure it out.' He wanted to be a chocolate maker, so he was going to make chocolate; then he was making cider, then baking bread — doing all the things. He was just like, 'Go for it.'"
That's the ethos this tournament carries forward, five years in. And it's the ethos that a lot of what ForeBoard has become is built on too.
A personal note
I went to college with Brock at Pacific Lutheran University, where we played baseball together, and lived in the "baseball house" just off campus. Some of my most vivid memories include coming back from offseason morning trainings and while he'd cook breakfast in the kitchen downstairs, I'd sit on the couch and listen to him rattle off his ideas and dreams. At the time, he was huge on cacao. I was always in awe of his knowledge and vision.
Getting to spend three years now at Birdies for Brock, and getting to run this year's scoring, on something I built, was an indescribable honor. Every year, Elise makes this event a little better than the year prior. Every year, the total grows, and MCP does a little more for a kid whose family didn't ask to be in a hospital.
Nathan and Elise at the post-round reception.
Thank you to Elise, to Larissa, to the Gates family, to Melodic Caring Project, to every sponsor and every player who showed up this year. And thank you to Brock — for being the guy who believed in taking action.
We finished our round this year thanking Brock for getting us all together. That's who he was.
Support MCP's mission or learn more about the tournament at Birdies for Brock.
Running a tournament for a cause you care about? Set it up on ForeBoard → Free at any field size, players score in a mobile web browser, live leaderboard for the field and your sponsors. If you want to talk about how a specific event might work, my email is nathan@foreboard.app — I read every message.
