Frontier Days Tournament

Our club’s annual tournament is coming up soon! Many of our members are already either signed up to play in or volunteer for it. Here are some related things you should be aware of:

Tournament Prep Lessons: A group of coaches from Washington state will be teaching 8 different lessons called The Tournament Experience at our courts immediately before the tournament. Sign up for as many of the a la carte classes as you want. Each one is 3 hours long, has a specific area of focus, and costs $100. Learn more and pre-register at their website.

Court Availability: Ahead of the tournament and of course during the tournament, there will be some limitations on court availability. Specifically:

June 12: Court Cleaning day. Mark O’Brian will be leading a group cleaning the courts starting at 9 am. Please contact Mark directly (csmark59@yahoo.com) if you are interested in helping. Often, once the courts are cleaned and dry, they can be played on afterwards, but please be aware that cleaning will be the priority on this date.

June 18 - 21: Some of our courts will be needed for The Tournament Experience as mentioned above, as well as general prep for the tournament. Some courts will still be available for Open Play, but please expect there might be fewer of them and you may have to be flexible such as moving off a particular court while any prep needed on it is completed.

June 22 - 26: Tournament play will take up all the courts all day.

Raffle prizes: Members of our club have been hard at work collecting donations from local businesses and pickleball-related companies to raffle off at the event. When you come out to play or cheer on your fellow club members at the tournament, make sure to stop by the raffle table and buy some tickets.

Tournament Schedule: Final times for each event are still TBD, but you can find which events are on which days on PickleballTournaments.com, and start times will be added when we get closer. Even if you aren’t playing, you should come watch — this event pulls in a LOT of very talented players, especially in the Open events, and it is amazing to get to see such high caliber play right here in La Pine. Plus it’s a fun time and great to have people out there cheering on our club members!

Court Access

As mentioned in an email last month, our club has changed the locks on the gates to the courts from keyed locks to combo locks. The main benefit of this is that all members can access the courts at any time they want, no longer limited by captain availability, using the combination. Many people have already been taking advantage of this and we think it is a huge improvement for our club.

Unfortunately, there was one incident last month where it seems one of the locks was not put back in place and some problems resulted. We are trying to work through this with LPRD because we want to continue to provide access to the courts to all our members. But, it is critical that everyone makes sure that if they are the last person/group to leave, you MUST make sure the gates at both ends are locked properly. Even if it’s early in the day and you think others are coming out to play later. ALWAYS lock the courts.

On a related note, please remember that anyone under 18 must have a parent or designated adult present whenever they are at the courts.

Thank you!

Our club benefits from the support and help of all our members. In particular this month we want to thank Suzanne Cournoyer for the work she has been doing patching the courts to get them ready for the tournament. Also, Mike Patzer has been busy sanding and repainting the benches, with help from Cheryl Patzer and Cathy Hundley. Thank you all!

And, if you have been to the courts in the last day or so, you might have noticed your car breathing a sigh of relief as you pulled into the parking lot. For that we have huge thanks to local excavation contractor Vic Russell for working with Roger Allen to bring in 40 yards of rock to repair the potholes in the road to the courts. Please drive slowly over the fill to keep it in place as long as possible, and call Vic for all of your excavation needs.

Indoor Play

Please note that while it doesn’t always feel like summer outside quite yet, we are on our summer play schedule now which does not include any access to the indoor courts at LPRD. When the fall rolls around, we’ll add indoor play time back to our schedule. For now, come to the outdoor courts prepared for sun/wind/rain/sleet (all in the same day!).

Court Reserve

Hopefully everyone has had a chance to login to their account on Court Reserve now. If you are having any problems (logging in, registering for an event, reserving a court, etc.), please drop us an email with details of your issue at lapinepick@gmail.com and we’ll try to help.

Central Oregon Pickleball Players League

Our club’s women's team in this new league played its first match of the season last week at Black Butte Ranch. While the team did not get the win, it was a fun day of pickleball in a beautiful Central Oregon location.

Board Update

Our club’s new treasurer was out of town and missed our photo shoot for the previous board update. I managed to snag him in between camping trips, so without further delay, here’s your new Treasurer, Roger Allen:

New Members

Our club continues to add more players. Welcome, and looking forward to seeing you all on the courts!

Alex Apple

Melanie Mangin

Steve Mangin

Diane Heinzelman

Jennifer Deveney

Brian Deveney

Steve Gratton

Kevin Cole

The Wider World of Pickleball

Major League Pickleball rang the opening bell for the NYSE, and played an exhibition match in the NYSE boardroom! The videos of this are pretty amazing to watch — probably the swankiest pickleball venue ever. Also, the APP NYC Open was held at Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, i.e. the home of the US Open Tennis tournament. Read more about these events here.

Also, this article about pickleball in Sports Illustrated. I was blissfully unaware of all the competing organizations within our sport until I read this article, but I guess it’s to be expected in such a fast growing sport. I’ve read some criticisms of the article as well, indicating it might not be completely accurate. But, it’s still pretty interesting to have some insight into why there are so many confusing acronyms (APP, PPA, WFP, IFP, MLP) being thrown around in professional pickleball, and why some of the top players seem to not play each other very often (hint: exclusivity contracts).