Wednesday, April 26, 2017 (Court Day #21)

I got to the Scotts Valley courts just before 6:30 and games were in full swing. I was person number 17, meaning I was sitting on the bench by myself watching four games of doubles going on. It’s interesting being a dedicated outside observer to games. After analyzing my own failings on video, it makes it easier to spot strategic errors by other players. Colleen was the closest player and, while she’s solid player, I noticed she had a tendency to break out of the soft game a bit early—before she had a clear winner. (“Winner”—winning shot.) Though I wasn’t about to interrupt their game to offer my advice! I appreciate advice myself, but you have to be careful giving it, people can get annoyed!

It wasn’t too long before Alan arrived. I invited him to warm up with me and he accepted.

A man wandered over asking Alan randomly about tennis lessons for his child while also being curious about what the heck was being played. Alan explained pickleball and after I dinked a bit with this fellow, the man found himself suckered into a game by Maree, along with her husband Mark, and myself. When the man’s cell phone rang in his shorts pocket, our game was one point away from finishing, but the bell had tolled and off he went—saying he’d probably be back to play more.

I got three important pieces of advice tonight.

Colleen said that I’ll have better success on returning short hits over the net if I come to a complete stop before hitting the ball. Gee, you’d think that after I’d heard this 5000 times that I’d be able to implement this advice!

Alan said that when I hit a dink into the net—fortunately fairly rare—I had taken my eye off the ball at the last second to look where I intended to hit the ball to. I’ll have to investigate this further.

Dave (former neighbor) played as my partner and really brought to the fore my delay in running up to the kitchen. He was good at calling me out on that. We’re not talking a long time, but even a few seconds count.

Dave and I played Alan and Colleen twice and lost both games by a roughly 2:1 margin. Colleen commended my net play, which was a nice gesture. All the more reason to get to the kitchen line as soon as humanly possible.

Play wrapped up right about 9 p.m. Eric was there but we never played on the same court. I did play a game or two with Rick, however . . . we played a game against Alan and Eric’s friend Jeanine, the newbie. Jeanine is good at hitting the ball but is still coming to terms with the bounce characteristics of a pickleball (versus a tennis ball) and also where she needs to be on the court—she’d sometimes find herself trying to hit a ball from an awkward position.

Overall, it was a decent night in terms of my play. Some really great hits and fewer bad hits. Still not stellar, but not completely crappy. My play at the net is getting stronger—both volleys and dinking. That and I had at least two shots (not serves) where I intentionally imparted a lot of spin. It was satisfying to see a strong player like Alan trying to dink a shot like that back then have it due into the net. Maybe I’ll actually make it to 4.0 someday!

I have a trip out of town coming up next week where I’ll miss Wednesday and Thursday pickleball. I may get to play Sunday next week, but we’ll see if that works out. Hopefully, Sunday this weekend will work out.

Number of days on a court: 21
Number of total hours: 60.5