This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2006, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
LOGAN - Pickleball, anyone?
If you're game, grab a paddle and a Wiffle ball, dash off to a rejiggered tennis court or toss up a badminton net and start volleying.
More and more Utahns are catching on to - or catching up with - the 40-year-old craze.
The Huntsman World Senior Games in St. George features pickleball competitions. Newly hooked players increasingly are chalking pickleball lines on three Utah State University tennis courts set aside for the sport. And Logan Parks and Recreation officials are open to the prospect of hosting pickleball matches on city courts.
"It's like playing Ping-Pong, only you run on the 'table,' " explains Judi Schutt.
She and her husband, Tom, bring their passion for pickleball with them to Logan during the summer, when they flee the heat of their home in Sun City West, Ariz., for the cooler climes of Cache County.
Pickleball is popular among all ages, but especially with seniors because physical strength is less important than agility.
"It's not a game of power," says Saddlebrook, Ariz., resident Bob Perez, who summers in Logan. "It's more a game of getting the ball in position. Men and women have an equally good chance."
Clarice Simons alternates between tennis and pickleball six days a week in Arizona during the winter and Logan during the summer. The Sun City West resident carries her pickleball gear - a short, solid wood paddle, a Wiffle ball and chalk - in the trunk of her car.
She is a gold-medal winner from the Arizona Senior Olympic Pickleball Doubles in the "over 75" category and has her eye on the upcoming Huntsman World Senior Games.
"Pickleball is a lot easier on your body [than tennis]," Simons says. "It's a faster game that offers a lot more action with fewer chances of getting hurt."
The game was born one lazy summer four decades ago in Seattle.
Peggy Pritchard Olson was 16 years old when her father, Joel Pritchard, and a friend, Bill Bell, scavenged an old badminton net, a Wiffle ball and rough-hewn Ping-Pong paddles to entertain the family one afternoon at the Pritchard home.
"Once they started doing this, they just became consumed," Olson says in a telephone interview from her home in Edmonds, Wash. "It was supposed to be a game for kids, but the adults just took over."
She remembers learning about the popularity of the game as it spread to Indonesia. In his later life, Olson says, her father, a former U.S. congressman, counted the invention of the game as one of his grandest accomplishments.
To this day, pickleball's enduring and increasing popularity amazes Olson. But wherever the sport spreads, it carries a heartwarming myth - perpetuated in books and on Web sites - about the origin of the game's name.
Nearly every player tells the tale about the Pritchard family cocker spaniel, Pickles, after whom people believe the game was named because of his affection for chasing the Wiffle ball.
"The dog was a cockapoo, and he was named after the game, not the other way around," Olson says. "People started saying pickleball was named after the dog, and it has just taken on a life of its own."
Truth is, no one can remember who came up with the name, Olson says, or why the game is called pickleball.
But the fable doesn't faze Olson.
"[Pickles] was a great dog," she says, "and if he goes down in history as being remembered for naming the game, that's just fine."
Where and how to play
Pickleball is played indoors or outdoors on a badminton-size court with a tennis net or badminton net lowered to 34 inches at the center.
Players often use chalk or tape to temporarily convert a tennis court (78 feet by 36 feet) to a smaller pickleball court (20 feet by 44 feet) for doubles and singles.
The game begins after an underhand serve is executed (diagonally across court). The ball must hit twice (once on each side) before it can be volleyed from the air. This is known as the double-bounce rule.
Both players on the serving team are allowed one attempt to serve and a team shall score points only when serving. A game is played to 11 points and a team must win by 2.
Rallies are lost by failing to return the ball inbounds to the opponent's court before the second bounce, volleying in the non-volley zone (the 7-foot area on both sides of the net referred to as "the kitchen") or by violating the double-bounce rule.
Source: USA Pickleball Association at http://www.usapa.org