What a week, a great bike ride on the Great Allegheny Passage from Meyersdale to the Mason-Dixon Line and back, 5 straight days of pickleball in great weather, assembling furniture for my daughter, pet sitting my daughters cat while she and my wife are at the shore, and finally getting some lawn work done.  It is probably good for me to have the rain slow me down and just get a little mellow for a couple days.  In the coming week I will travel up to Time Square to see my 2024 Great Cycle Challenge photo up on one of the big electronic billboards in Times Square for my 8 seconds of fame and I will probably be logging in a bunch of steps as I explore the city.  A couple of rainy days should help me recharge.  Let's take a spin around the Pickleverse and see what's shaking.

1. One Day Fun Day Tournament - Replacement teams have been created so Centre County/Bernel will be able to compete for the Central Pennsylvania Pickleball Cup on Saturday.  The teams are as follows:  Carla W. and Frank J., Ronda R. and Anthony W., Linda P. and Steve F., Tina R. and Randy H.  On Friday I will repost the link for the live stream camera at the courts if you want to watch some play. 

2. More Tournament Opportunities - If you check out the documents/images below there are tournaments at Portage, Lock Haven, and Johnstown in September.  I am waiting for more information on the Lock Haven tournament and when I get that I will share.

3. Team Pickleball:  Drew from the YMCA updated me that they will soon open up the opportunity to declare for the team pickleball draft. His message is below. Here's the catch.  There are limited spaces available.  If you do not receive emails directly from Drew and you want to try and snag a roster spot I highly recommend emailing him and getting on his email list.  If you wait for my re-post, all the spots may be claimed.  Here is Drew's email: dvontish@gmail.com .

4. Gorilla House Stepping Up - At the end of July the Gorilla House Gym in Altoona decided that pickleball must be more than a fad.  Formerly when they had a pickleball rental they used masking tape for the lines on their existing indoor tennis courts and would then pull them up after the pickleball session.  The G-House has stepped up and they now have 12 indoor pickleball courts (4 pickleball courts on each tennis court) and painted the pickleball lines.  I have a photo grab from their FB page below.  Blair County Pickleball Club has the best information about rates and session times so if you are interested follow this link or call the G-House.  https://www.blaircountypickleballclub.com/

5. Tip Of The Week - this week's tip came about from a confluence of events at Friday's games.  I had a particularly good stretch of serving,  I have been experimenting with a few modifications that have added a touch more pop.  On one rotation I was server #2 and the person awaiting the serve was surprised when I served up a less challenging ball.  That led to me doing about 30 to 45 seconds, mid-game, of explaining my theories around risk and reward when it comes to serving.  In a nutshell we all know that is the only shot we get that we face uncontested, we control all non-environmental aspects.  A player's ability to hit deep serves with high consistency will provide them with a better path to winning a point.  Once a player hits that plateau of landing the serve deep in the receiver's court they usually look to expand on that by varying their serves with spin, angles, off-speed, and power.  The downside is that the "kick it up a notch" serves come with a greater risk of failure.  Risk is fine, if you can afford it.  In the example I gave, I was server #2.  If I net the ball our opponents take over.  With that in mind, I usually will go with a safer serve with maybe just a little side spin but deep to the service box.  When my partner and I are down "X" points I need to make sure my serve gets the point started so I have to go a bit safer.  On the flip side if we are up 3 or 4 points and I am server #1 I have a bit more freedom to try and crank one or go heavy spin or even a lob serve to mess with their mind.  Remember that pickleball games are more often won by the opponents mistakes than by winners you and your partner hit.  Pick the right time and place to go for that sexy shot until then, keep the ball in play.  

6. Pickleball 101 - I need to confirm a date with The Centre but I am targeting early October for the next Pickleball 101.  Chewing up bike miles in September will be messing with my schedule so I am waiting for October for the next session.

Have a great week, the link for The Centre is below:

The Centre:  https://www.signupgenius.com/go/70A0B4BA5AA28AB9-50763243-nvsc#/

Randy Hoffman

Holbrook PIckleball Ambassador

https://holbrookpickleball.com/

Discount Code = RANDYHOFFMAN20

State College Y Team Pickleball League, from Drew (dvontish@gmail.com)

Dear Pickleballers,

An email will be sent out on Monday at 7 pm with details about how to register for the team pickleball league. Registration will be on a first-come, first-serve basis and is likely to fill up quickly. Cocaptains have volunteered to lead each team and will participatein a draft to select team members.

We are looking for;
  -8 women and 8 men to play at the intermediate level
  -8 women and 8 men to play at the advanced level

Please read through the details below including the scheduled match dates. Please note that ideally candidates should be available for 5, or even 6, of the dates. A player available for 4 of the matches could possibly be a sub. Availability for 3 or fewer dates would exclude a candidate. First preference in the league is given to members of the Y.

Look for the email on Monday at 7 pm with all of the details. Please feel free to share this message. Thanks,

Drew

How does team pickleball work? Four teams of six players in the intermediate bracket compete against each other. There will also be four teams of six players each in the advanced bracket. Each team plays the other three teams twice.

How do teams play each other? Each match will include one women’s and one men’s doubles contest and two mixed doubles contests. Each of these is best two of three games to 11, win by two.

What’s the first step? Each team needs to have two co-captains - one woman and one man. What does a co-captain do? They coach, select players, organize their team, participate as players, and report in scores. Co-captans will be assigned.