The Cape Girardeau Disc Golf Club is hosting the second annual SEMO Ice Bowl, a registered disc golf event that is affiliated with the Professional Disc Golf Association.

The event is one of many registered disc golf tournaments held within the months of January and February that are involved in an international fundraiser focused on hunger relief.

Each year a series of these registered Ice Bowl tournaments are held around the world in order to raise donations for local food pantries, food banks or other charitable organizations.

According to Ronnie Colle, the tournament director, the local Ice Bowl event is dedicated to benefit the Southeast Missouri Food Bank.

"That day we're going to be selling raffle tickets, and giving away prizes and gift cards that were donated to us," Colle said. "That's where we make most of our money at, the raffle tickets. I'm just working on trying to get some food donated. One thing I just started doing to try and raise as much money as we can is we're giving away $375 worth of discs. I really want to try to push donating at least $1,000."

Many local businesses have reached out to support the cause by donating gift cards, coupons and other prizes to be raffled off at the Ice Bowl.

Burritoville, Port Cape Girardeau, Hot Shots Sports Bar & Grill, Cape West 14 Cine and Sport Clips are some of the local businesses who are cooperating with Colle for the event.

The Ice Bowl is a great way to bring the community together to provide hunger relief and support a great sport according to Caleb Crumley, a member of the Disc Golf Club and student at Southeast Missouri State University.

"It's a great fundraiser for the SEMO Food Bank," Crumley said. "It's a really low fund demanding sport. I mean it is a sport, there is even a professional division. The community that plays is really embracing, really welcome to newcomers. Even when we see single people playing on the course we will ask them if they want to play with us, stuff like that. We've all been trying to do tournaments. The Ice Bowl will actually be one of the most unique ways to play Scott City now because this will be the first chance to play off of all the ultimate tee pads and ultimate pins."

The Scott City disc golf course has only been established for a couple of years but it is the most locally favored course by members of the Disc Golf Club according to Crumley.

Cyclewerx is a local bike shop that also sells disc golf supplies, with a connection to the Scott City course. The business has donated its time and effort in the past to make sure the Ice Bowl was a success. Crumley also stated that Cyclewerx will be present to help out with this year's tournament.

"Putting the Scott City disc golf course in really solidified disc golf in the community because then we had multiple places to play," Crumley said. "It's a good variety. Its 18 holes not ten. Navigation is great. If you have never played before it's very straightforward. There's a lot of newcomer holes. Theo Wagner, he works at Cyclewerx, and he is actually the one who designed the Scott City course. They are the ones who run everything and set the rules up. When we got involved we were going around to different stores just trying to find to the best deal and then when we came upon Cyclewerx. They're the ones that really solidified us playing. They wanted to help us and they wanted this sport to grow."

Even with inclement weather making its way through the area the Disc Golf Club is not worried about rescheduling the event. The slogan "No Wimps. No Whiners," backs the international tradition of ensuring the event takes place on the scheduled date no matter what the weather is like.

Colle is not worried about the turnout of the event because he is confident it will be a success according to pre registration numbers.

"Right now we have 32 people pre registered," Colle said. "We're going to leave to preregistration open but I'm really expecting ten to 15 more people to show up the day of. So closely up to 40 or 50 people. Normally not many people play disc golf in the winter because it snows, it's cold, it gets dark a lot earlier in the day. That is one thing that we do. No wimps. No whiners. We play whether its rain sleet or snow, no matter what. Hopefully the weather is going hold off to where it's not actually going to rain or snow that day. I think if it warms up a lot this week it's going to make everything pretty muddy but I know for a fact everybody that has signed up so far is going to show up."

The Ice Bowl will be held at Scott City Park on Saturday.

The event will even include a raffle and lunch will be provided during the intermission between games.

Participants can enter the disc throwing contest during the event in order to win the prize bundle of 15 discs worth $25 each.

Preregistration will remain open at discgolfunited.com and same day registration will be available with a $25 entry fee.