Pickleball, perhaps it will become the sport of 2024. Courts have been popping up like mushrooms in the Netherlands for a year and a half and new members continue to register. There are also enthusiastic pickleball players in Drenthe and Groningen, but what is this sport? “It’s nice to be moving together.”
Tock, tock, tock. “Shall we do a rally?” says Bert Mol (37), board member of Hollandscheveldse Tennis Club, while holding the light ball the size of a tennis ball. It starts to rain on the pickleball court. “Come on,” says Jan Jaap Uiterwijk Winkel (32), trainer at the club.
The ball is passed over at a high pace, only once does the ball bounce on the ground, after which Mol quickly hits the ball to the other side. But then Mol makes a mistake and the ball flies high into the air. Uiterwijk Winkel makes merciless use of it and smashes the ball over the net. Mole just can’t reach it and the ball bounces once, twice. “Next time I will win,” says Mol.
Pickleball, perhaps the new craze in 2024, is on the rise in the Netherlands. There are 139 jobs at 52 locations in the Netherlands, all available after 2022 and associations are seeing a large growth in the number of members. Also in it viral video Mol saw the ball sport in the VPRO program Plakshot about Yuppenball. “A friend forwarded it to me and I immediately noticed: those are pickleball rackets,” he says.
Badminton a padel
But what is this sport? “It is actually a mix of many different sports,” says Mol. The size of the court is the same as badminton. The net just hangs lower. Just as low as padel, the sport that pickleball also has similarities with. The rackets are about the same size. But where padel is played in a cage with glass walls, pickleball has no walls.
The way of playing is also different. “With padel you play very defensively through those walls, which is why I like pickleball better: it is much more offensive,” says Uiterwijk Winkel.
For everyone
Mol and Uiterwijk Winkel are very enthusiastic about the sport. They prefer to continue playing, it doesn’t matter if it’s raining. “I think it’s so nice that everyone can play this sport,” says Mol. According to him, pickleball is very accessible. “There are all kinds of holes in the ball through which the wind blows, which makes the ball slower,” says Uiterwijk Winkel while pointing to the yellow ball. This makes it easier for everyone to hit the ball back.
That makes the sport fun for beginners who don’t have much ball control, explains Uiterwijk Winkel. The players also do not have to be in top condition. There are often four people in the field. Two on one side of the net, two on the other. “Then you don’t have to run so much. And even if the ball goes out, you quickly pick it up. The field is not that big,” says Uiterwijk Winkel.
Many fanatics also find it a fun sport. “Like the rally we just had, we are both close to the net and the ball taps quickly from one to the other,” says Uiterwijk Winkel. “Then some tactics come into play, smart balls.” Such as tapping the ball just over the net, making it difficult for the other person to hit the ball back, he explains.
‘Old fart sport’
“Actually, pickleball is table tennis on a large scale, nice and fast and short balls,” says Mol. Everything that is used: the fields, rackets and balls, are one size larger. Pickleball sometimes has a bad image, according to Mol it is seen as an ‘old nonsense sport’. The sport originally comes from the United States, where mainly elderly people play the sport.
But Mol certainly does not agree with that. “Many of our pickleball members are in their 30s and 40s.” And pickleball is often played during gym class at schools. He can still remember how enthusiastic a twelve-year-old boy was after a clinic. He ran to his mother and announced, “I want to quit football and play pickleball.”
‘Always full’
The two pickleball courts in Hollandscheveld in Drenthe have been there since May 2022. The tennis club was one of the first in the Netherlands. In those eighteen months, ninety people have joined the club. But why pickleball? “The popularity of tennis decreased and I participated in a clinic organized by Jan Jaap (Uiterwijk Winkel) and that appealed to me and so did the board,” says Mol.
He notices that there is a lot of attention for the sport. For example, people can now also play pickleball in Coevorden and the Hollandscheveld association has almost no room for new members. That is why the board is considering building a third pickleball court.
Pickleball in Groningen
The craze also spreads to Groningen. From this spring, Stadjers can play pickleball at Kardinge and pickleball is already being played in Finsterwolde. Six months ago, the table tennis club still had 20 members. Since the introduction of pickleball, that number has doubled.
According to secretary Gertjan Takens (58), the association is strict with the schedule due to the crowds. “Sometimes we have to send people off the field so that others can play too.” He is just as fanatical. “I prefer to be on the field all evening.”
Takens expects that the sport will only continue to grow. “We do hold tournaments with the association, but how nice would it be if we didn’t have to travel so far to other associations to play matches?” That’s how Bert Mol and Jan Jaap Uiterwijk Winkel see it too. “It’s nice to be moving together,” says Mol.
The rain has now turned into a light drizzle in Hollandscheveld. “Another one?” Uiterwijk Winkel asks Mol. “I’ll catch you this time,” says Mol and hits the ball.
2024-01-02 15:15:30
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