Thurday, February 24, 2022 (Court Day #472)
USA Pickleball sent out their periodic newsletter this week and it included this tidbit:
I was actually surprised that are only about 55,000 paying members of the association. Out of nearly 5 million estimated players in the USA, only about 1% are members of the national organization.
Late Arrival
I had to finish a time-sensitive order to place for work and I didn’t get to Skypark until 7:30. I debated going home since it was quite cold, but that cold made parking extremely easy. There were less than 10 players there when I arrived.
Missing Paddle
When I went to grab my paddle from my backpack, I realized that it was not my Tempest Wave paddle that I noticed was missing on Tuesday, it was my main Players Rogue 2 paddle! Drat. It had either fallen out in my car or in my garage or I must have left it somehow at Brommer—in which case I hope it’s still there! I ended up using my ProKennex paddle instead.
I got in just one good game tonight. I had “Matt with the hat” with me against firefighter Matt S. and Tim. That was a good game. There were two overheads where they clipped the edge of my paddle and flew off wildly. If I had my regular paddle, which is slightly longer, I might have pulled off those shots.
I played a game with Josh against Eric and another Matt, shorter and stockier. These are all part of the clan of friends with tall Paul and Matt with the hat. Josh and I clobbered them, even with me playing lefty. Matt was obviously the weakest player. I opted to play with him for the next game. Eric and Josh kidded Matt, saying if he lost again, it’d be obvious who the weak link was. But he didn’t lose again. With me playing lefty, we won.
I opted to sit out a game. I checked the time. 9:10. I hung around, gauged the game scores and the time and opted to head home at 9:16 after saying my goodbyes.
When I got home, I emailed a few people asking if they’d seen my paddle at Brommer.
Friday, February 25, 2022 (No Play)
Leslie emailed back this morning saying my paddle was in the bin at Brommer. Thats a relief!
Mainstream?
Pickleball has been getting a lot of media exposure lately.
An NPR radio feature on the 15th:
https://www.npr.org/2022/02/15/1080773481/as-international-participation-grows-pickleball-could-end-up-in-the-olympics
The Guardian had an article on the 21st:
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2022/feb/21/pickleball-the-oddly-named-sport-thats-sweeping-the-us
Gawker, a tongue-in-cheek article on the 22nd:
https://www.gawker.com/culture/who-is-behind-big-pickleball
The Times (UK) had an article on the 22nd, though a subscription is required to read it:
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/pickleball-the-star-backed-sport-with-a-shot-at-the-olympics-wds5t720h
Paddle Collection
After work, I stopped by Brommer Park to collect my forgotten paddle. I’d never been there at night. It is very dark! Sure enough, my errant paddle was in a fabric bag of paddles in the locked bin. Fortunately, the key for SCPC site coordinators is universal and opens club bins at any location.
I put my last name on all my paddles once I got home!
New Different Paddle
Jordan Briones came out with a new video covering a new training paddle. Same length but a much smaller head so that you have to be very accurate with your paddle to ball contact. The idea is that you train yourself to hit the ball with the sweet spot of your regular paddle. While I haven’t tried it, it seems like a really good idea:
https://youtu.be/WWb3CS69nqs
Here’s a link to the Focus training paddle website:
https://focustrainingpaddles.com
It runs about $100. I’m thinking this could be great for when I’m playing weak players . . . it’d help level the playing field, so to speak.
Jordan also shared a link in the above video to his set of drills:
https://www.brionespickleball.com/brionesworkout
Number of days on a court: 472
Number of total hours: 2,248.5
To start at the beginning of this blog click on “1st Post” in the menu above.
Leave a Reply