Canadians just can't get enough of pickleball
Popularity of intergenerational game soaring
It started as an early-summer pandemic activity that could be done safely with friends who, like me, were feeling the effects of being cooped up in the house for weeks on end. A portable net, paddles bought online, lawn chairs, coolers and a quiet street next to my house. It wasn't long before pickleball became a passion. That was a year ago, and we're still out there several days a week hitting balls and talking about the points that got away.
“It's an easy sport to pick up, learn and enjoy,” said Jim Parrott, president of Pickleball Canada, an organization designed to promote pickleball's growth. “Within a few minutes (on the court), you can have an enjoyable game.”
The sport was created in the mid-1960s by three American dads and their bored kids, who grabbed whatever pieces of equipment they could find — a badminton net, a Wiffle ball and some table-tennis paddles — and started playing a mash-up of their families' favourite games. They eventually lowered the net, put together a few rules and a new sport was born — named after a family dog, Pickles, who liked to take off with the ball. Ten years later the first pickleball tournament was held, and 10 years after that the USA Pickleball Association was formed.
Today, pickleball has been dubbed the fastest-growing sport in Canada. Membership in Pickleball Canada has grown from 5,000 to 22,000 players in just five years, and a pre-pandemic Ipsos poll put the number of Canadians playing pickleball at 350,000.
The game is still played on a badminton-size court (20'/6 m x 44'/13.4 m), with a net a few inches shorter than a regulation tennis net (36”/91.4 cm at the ends and 34”/86.3 cm in the middle), and rackets that look like oversized table-tennis paddles. The small court is easy to cover, which makes it attractive to tennis players who have lost a step or two over the years. In fact, the 50-plus crowd has been responsible for much of pickleball's growth.
Parrott says the sport travelled across the border from Arizona and Florida by way of Canadian snowbirds who brought their love of the game with them. But these days you'll likely see more than just a bunch of boomers hitting the ball around your local court.
“With better reflexes and mobility, younger people enjoy the game at a whole different level,” said Parrott.
There's no doubt that pickleball is gaining credibility among millennials and GenXers, with no better example than a recent shout-out by UFC fighter and Kansas City native Julian Marquez, who challenged NFL superstars Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce and Tyreek Hill of the Kansas City Chiefs to a battle on the courts.
Don't get the wrong idea — pickleball isn't about who has the hardest shot. Mastering the sport means learning the art of “dinking,” which is trading strategically placed soft shots inside the no-volley zone (also called the “kitchen”) — the seven-foot area on either side of the net. Players can't stand inside the no-volley zone and smash the ball at their opponents. The rules require an underhand serve that is used primarily to put the ball in play, not to earn an ace.
The family-friendly rules make it easy for kids and teens to play with parents and grandparents, so it's a perfect intergenerational game. American Leigh Waters and her 15-year-old daughter Anna Leigh Waters are ranked close to the top of the pro league, with Anna Leigh regularly playing against men and women 20, 30 and 40 years her senior. As the popularity of pickleball grows among Canadians of all ages, municipalities are struggling to meet demand, repurposing underused tennis courts or adding pickleball lines to existing courts. Before the pandemic, Steve Deakin — who is ranked among the Top 10 doubles players in the world — held weekend clinics in cities across Canada for pickleball enthusiasts. These days, he offers video analysis of individual or doubles play and has more work than his schedule will allow. The former tennis player, who lives in Pitt Meadows, says pickleball is still building momentum among all ages and abilities — a trend he doesn't see slowing any time soon.