Hi it's Rusty from Pickleball Channel in these interesting times with a worldwide
lockdown things can feel kind of isolating so we wanted to take a moment
and share with you some of what's happening in the pickleball community
around the country now recreational play has obviously been changed and the USAPA
has a large network of pickleball ambassadors who are dealing with this at
the local level
1,900 ambassadors across the country recreation play has pretty much
come to somewhat of a halt we it's been very difficult because we are getting
news in that you know that they're they're shut down and that they're you
know concerned about how we're gonna develop keep the programs going
state and local authorities have had to deal with the tough challenge of both
serving the recreational needs of the pickleball players and also trying to
keep them safe
we left the courses open for a while and it seems like and we were giving instructions to people if this seems
like the you know a lot of people follow the rules but there's this that small
minority that this didn't seem like they wanted to cooperate or listen and
they're you know they're too close or not you know practicing social distance
and unfortunately we had to come to a decision of closing these things down
but you know right now as a as a group you know you look at cities all across
the countries not only like a mid-sized city like Norman OK that you look
at larger cities Dallas Houston Los Angeles New York we're all working
together to help stop the spread quicker we decide stay home the more we work
together to stop this disease to stopping these spreads the quicker we'll
get our parks back
in addition to recreational play many players have also
lost the opportunity to play in tournaments
well a lot of the decisions being made for them right by the government local
type decisions that are closing down the facilities of social distancing when
that came down as a recommendation was a big reason that people had to cancel
events I mean can you imagine running a pickleball tournament with staying six
feet apart from everybody
March we saw 43% of the tournaments
were canceled 57% have been rescheduled we saw those numbers you know continue
to grow into April with 30% being canceled 70% of those tournaments being
rescheduled tournament directors are facing the tough decision whether to
postpone or entirely cancel a tournament that they've spent months or even an
entire year planning
so it was a significant significant decision and a
lot of thought that went into a couple of major tournaments that are that were
to come up in the US Open and the USA pickleball Indoor Championships the
decision is to cancel those or reschedule those was very brave to do
and really showed the respect that both the US Open and the USAPA have for the
pickleball community and the pickleball culture by making sure that they made
decisions that would impact impact others further who were having to make
reschedule or cancellation decisions that weren't be easy in addition to
playing the shutdown's impacting the entire pickleball industry from coaches
and clinics to manufacturers and retailers so from a business perspective
we're seeing that equipment sells are down significantly but on the flip side
we're seeing a significant increase in inquiries from people on how can they
set up their own personal pickleball space for their own personal play or
play with their families
so this is the new normal and everyone including the
USAPA are looking for new ways to stay connected
so what are we doing now for
keeping ourselves active we started a program pickleball strong hashtag
pickleball strong and we are making sure that we're trying to get people involved
and getting excited to stay excited about pickleball through these times as
we move to the future
now while playing pickleball is difficult during the
shutdown some players are finding some pretty unique ways to be pickleball
strong online
so let's stay pickleball strong keep in touch with your friends stay active
mentally and physically and remember let's all work together to keep this
pickleball community thriving so that when we're back on the courts it'll be
stronger than ever and until then stay safe stay healthy and stay connected