Seacoast Open Dart Tournament

Next to the rows of dartboards are tablets scoring the games as the tournament goes on. Dart Connect was not intended for tournaments, but has grown to optimize the events. Rob Smith, organizer of Seacoast Open, said he went from needing 15 to five personnel to run the event. Not only are scores immediately recorded and the bracket calculated, but the app notifies players where and when they play next.

“We’ll never pick up a piece of chalk again,” David Macher said.

Macher is the principal and founder of Dart Connect, whose goal was to create something that would allow for “more people to play more darts more often.” Since launching in 2014, the app gained popularity as players would bring their tablets to tournaments to calculate the scores, to now tournaments solely using tablets. Outside of tournaments, app users can play against a computer or another player anywhere in the world from their own home.

Yet, some will still travel to play. Tim Welcome, 15 from Andover, was excited when he heard he was one of two invited to play in the youth’s World Cup in South Korea. Tim practices everyday, but enjoys meeting new people at tournaments.

“I’ve done two other sports,” Kirsten Dahl said. “I’ve never seen camaraderie like this. Socio-economic statuses don’t exist here … that makes this game special.”

When Dahl was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2014, her local dart league held a fundraiser, collecting $7,500, which allowed Dahl to keep her house. After beating the cancer and returning to the game, Dahl celebrated her 60th year proudly competing on the world stage.

“We always come back,” Dahl said, "'cause you can’t really master it.”

Bill Welcome would concur, saying: “This you can play until they bury you.”