Blog: Order On The Court — How my pickleball journey started

Introduce a friend into pickleball and "Pay It Forward"

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The real reason I started playing pickleball

Yes, I know this week’s Blog’s cover art is a little cheeky. A little, self-possessed; but that’s ok. Us pickleball players have come out of the shadows and are ready to be counted.

I guess I could have called it, “Play to Lose, but Have Fun Pickleball.” But somehow it didn’t have quite the cachet as “Play To Win Pickleball.”

It might have been a harder sell with prospective new students.

“Yes, that’s right. Play to Lose, but Have Fun Pickleball, sign up right here.”

So yes, I’m competitive, my students are competitive, and if you’ve stuck around this long reading my blogs and web pages, chances are you’re pretty competitive by nature also.

And that’s ok. 

I used to think it was important to strike a balance between having fun, winning, and having fun, not winning, but it never works. 

I know I’m an instructor at heart though. I have to refrain from stopping, after an especially lopsided doubles win, and start offering the other players unsolicited, friendly advice. 

“Yes, popping the ball high up from the transition zone to my left side (I’m left handed) might not be the best tactic in that situation. But I’m sure we can find a better approach for beating southpaws.”

I think these helpful tips in recreational play are a no-no. But I’m not sure. Definitely not in competitive play. So I guess it just comes down to reading the room — the court, so to speak.

So I’m sticking with Play To Win Pickleball, and it seems to be working so far.

BTW, the quotes on the home page and site pages are real, and kinda unsolicited. I’ve gotten them off a post-Lesson Series evaluation survey I do of my lessons as a way to measure performance, their value, and the students level of satisfaction with my teaching. Pausing here, for all you Larry David fans out there, the results have been, “preeety, preeety good,” big smile.

To carry on with the premise of this week’s Blog, the reason I got into pickleball, was a bit of a fluke. I was living in a new community, west of Calgary, with new pickleball/tennis courts and I was stopped by a couple walking past the courts on my way to the lake.

Long story short, the couple was Tony and Linda van Son and they were starting a new pickleball club out at our lake community. Over a course of a couple of summers, pre-pandemic, they did their level best to convert me from a lifelong tennis player into a pickleball player. For which I’m hugely grateful, because they made me feel welcome, and worth their time and effort explaining why I couldn't serve and volley.

Or enter the kitchen to volley before the ball bounced. That was a hard habit to break

It was a humbling experience when an older gentleman in black knee socks invited me to play a friendly game of full court singles. He ran me ragged while daintily dunking me to oblivion. 

I knew I better learn the game fast when after giving him a couple of my hard top spin drives from the baseline. I  looked up to see him squarely at the Kitchen Line, holding his Joola paddle like a shield, with a big smile on his face.

Every weekend, from May until late October, the van Sons host players from the Cochrane Pickleball Club at the lake and put on recreational pickleball games with the emphasis on fun, and socializing.

Hugely popular, and pickleball at its best with all levels of play. Tony is one of the top ranked men’s player in his age group in Canada, so I learned from the best.

But the interesting thing is, I didn’t know it at the time, what a valuable resource I was given. Both Tony and Linda are terrific instructors, patient, supportive, knowledgeable. I kind of modelled myself after their approach of mentoring people in pickleball and helping grow the sport.

I didn’t have time to say it at the time, but I say it now, my active participation in pickleball, as a player, a student, a certified instructor, is kinda my way of “pay it forward” for whatever the Tony and Linda saw in me to provide that all important initial support.

I would encourage you, to find somebody who is new to pickleball, to invite them out to the court and give them a bit of your support and guidance when it really matters. Who knows, they could be the next world champion, a Canadian player

Good bye for now with a shout out to all my friends out on Ghost Lake in Cochrane, Alberta.