Kelvin had a known out of town conference in Tahoe this week but our pickleball friends kept talking about an indoor tournament at Bear River Recreation Center (Loleta, about 45 min from our house). While I think pickleball is generally fun, I'm not as competitive or intense as Iver nor Kelvin, but Iver really wanted to play competitively and enter this tournament. He's been playing multiple times per week, for hours at a time!
Iver and I played our first (and only) tournament in Arcata in November, coming in as runners-up in Mixed Doubles (with Jonathan, he won the Men's Doubles Championship!). Kelvin and I took third in the 3.5-and-higher tournament in Eureka in January, when I, disappointed in my own performance, vowed not to enter any more tournaments until I could get my volleying technique down.
In order to be officially linked to this tournament, we had to sign up for Fwango and DUPR, both Pickleball apps, which allow rankings (I rated myself at a 3.25, while Iver considers him much higher), and I had to make Iver his own accounts as an independent player with his own e-mail account. I also now have "Playtime scheduler," an app where you can see and join local pickleball games like at Carlson Park, nice outdoor courts which is where we prefer to play.
In any case, we went to the gym on Saturday morning to start our < 3.5 pickleball tourney with the other seven teams. We played pretty well, not losing any matches in the five matches of round-robin play (first-to-11-win-by-1), and then went on to the brackets, where there were three (single elimination) rounds (although they did have one game for third place). While we'd seen and played with many of the players at this tournament, we didn't know the couple (Becky/Toby) who we played in the Final (Becky had a unique lob serve and Toby hit with a lot of slice), but we handled them well, leading for almost all the match and eventually winning 15-12 (I think that was the final score!). Sara, who runs the McK pickleball drop-in, got the whole final on video, which was fun to watch later! My volleys were much better this time around, now learning to keep less of a continental grip and more of a forehand grip even at the net, and choking up on my paddle for quicker reaction times.
Niall brought some activity books and hung out on the sidelines while we played, and he did well (he did express, however, that he was hoping we'd get bounced in the elimination bracket so we could go home earlier!). We visited him in between our games. We stayed a bit past our match's conclusion (and medal acquisition!) to watch some of the rounds of the 3.5-5.0 players' brackets (there were so many teams that entered that there were two divisions! I think the winner was a mother/14-year-old son pair from Crescent City).
Iver was excited to learn that his "DUPR" rating was 3.726 by winning this tournament. I might now call myself a 3.5-ranked player, but definitely would have struggled to "play up," although that is what I told Iver we could do if we won it all. I have to say that, while Iver is raring to go for the next one, I'm not excited about playing the 3.5-5.0 players competitively anytime soon, so I'll stick to Saturday recreational pickleball without stakes! I think K and Iver will enter an August tournament locally but I may stay on the sidelines :) . Thanks to Humboldt Bay Pickleball Club and its leadership for organizing a great tournament for all ages!
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