Learning from Lessons

Mastery is in the reaching, not in the arriving.

Lessons can be great motivators...but only if the student comes with the right attitude to walk away with the right learnings. Sarah Ansbory has an article to discuss the right way to approach lessons. It is titled 3 Keys to Making the Most of Your Pickleball Lesson and excerpts are shown below. The ideas are a good things to keep in mind if you are attending the Mark Renneson clinic I posted yesterday.

I was recently asked, “Who are the players that are able to apply what they learned during a pickleball lesson to their game?”   I thought it was a great question! So I gave it some thought…

Mark Renneson In Asheville

Experts start as beginners...

Mark Renneson will be in Asheville next week to provide instruction opportunities to all levels of players. Intermediate and advanced players will have group drill and training sessions and all players can sign up for private lessons. This is a great opportunity to work with of the best instructors in the game. The sessions will be held at Stephens-Lee Recreation Ctr.,  30 George Washington Carver Ave, Asheville. Click here or the image below to go to the website.

November Beginner Clinic Photos

Experts start as beginners...

A beginner pickleball clinic was recently held at the Henderson County Athletics and Activity Center. Four players were introduced to the game by Henderson County USAPA ambassador Deb Romaine and local volunteer extraordinaire Larry Formicella.

With only 4 players and 2 courts, I was able to pull players away to work on specific problems. I had a great time and the players seemed to appreciate the individualized attention. All players were enthusiastic about pickleball and greatly appreciative of the instructions by Larry, as am I.

Some pictures of the clinic follow.

2017 Suncoast Pickleball Boot Camp Photos - Week 1

There is no crying in pickleball. Suck it up camper...

Russell Elefterion (Coach Russell) kicked off his 2017 boot camps at Montreat last week. I dropped in on Wednesday to take some photos. I arrived just as the players were returning to courts from lunch so I had little time to talk wit them. The comments I received were highly complimentary of the instructors, the facility, and even the food. Job well done, Russell!

The Instructors

Phil Bagley

Deb Harrison

Growing Pickleball in Hendersonville - the Current Generation

Experts start as beginners...

A beginner pickleball clinic was held on July 22 at the Henderson County Athletics and Activity Center. Sixteen new players attended the clinic which was organized by Henderson County USAPA ambassador Deb Romaine. Deb was ably assisted by fellow ambassador Larry Appleby and volunteers Duke Angier and Larry Formicella.

I briefly visited with some of the players and they were enthusiastic about the game of pickleball and greatly appreciative of the instructions by Deb and the other volunteers. They asked for more clinics in order to learn the game even faster.

Some pictures of the clinic follow.

Growing Pickleball in Hendersonville - the Next Generation

Experts start as beginners, especially when they are young...

Hendersonvile Racquet Club has the goal of providing a full range of racquet sports. Pickleball courts are the latest addition to their facilities with 3 Flex Courts recently installed. But their business remains primarily tennis. In the summer, they have youth tennis/sports camps where kids aged 7-18 are welcomed. The new courts have allowed expansion of the camp offerings to include pickleball. The club recently invited a member, Rich Ferragina,, and me to teach the campers how to play.

Rich and I had 6 players aged 9-15, all of whom enthusiastically learned the basics of play. Maybe one will be the next Kyle Yates or Simone Jardim.

Hendersonville Beginner Clinic

Experts start as beginners...

A beginner pickleball clinic will be held 11:30 - 1:30 on July 22 at the Henderson County Athletics and Activity Center on S Grove Street. Please invite friends and relatives who want to learn to play this wonderful game. The clinic will be run by Henderson County USAPA ambassador Deb Romaine. Her contact information is shown in her flyer below.

SE Regional Ambassador Retreat - Beginner Clinics (Part 2)

The mountains are calling and I must go...

Saturday's post kicked off the discussion of beginner clinics. It included a handout from Dick Osman's presentation at the SE Region ambassador retreat at the Beech Mountain Club. Dick had additional handouts with more details on the clinic content. These are shown below.

Outline for Beginners Clinic

1. Introduction

• Introduce Instructors
• What is Pickleball?
• Invented in 1965 in Washington State
• A combination of tennis, badminton, ping pong, paddle tennis, paddleball
• A game which is easy to learn, FUN, ADDICTIVE, and CONTAGIOUS
• By the end of this clinic, you will be a pickleball player!

2. Safety and Movement

• Proper footwear: court shoes or cross-trainers
• Hydration and sun protection; eye protection is recommended
• The Ready Position: wider base = low COG = better stability and balance
• Warm up by practicing safe movement on the court:
• Lateral movement: space out on the court in several rows, practice moving side to side shuffling, not crossing, feet
• Moving forward: demo moving forward with split step to stop; line up at baseline, 4-6 feet wide, practice a couple times
• Moving back: demo with drop step, line up 4-6 feet wide at NVZ line, practice a couple times on both sides
• “Ball” – stop play immediately and play a let

3. Hitting the Ball

SE Regional Ambassador Retreat - Beginner Clinics (Part 1)

The mountains are calling and I must go...

As I mentioned yesterday, a group of 41 USAPA ambassadors plus guests recently held a 3+ day retreat at the Beech Mountain Club. The retreat consisted of various learning sessions, of which one was beginner clinics. Dick Osman gave the presentation based on his experiences with clinics in the Charlotte area. Dick and his wife Desire are ambassadors and area team liaisons in Charlotte. Dick's handout is shown below and my discussion follows.

TEACHING PICKLEBALL TO BEGINNERS

• Every clinic is different: number of students/teachers, ages, time available, facilities, etc.

Suncoast Pickleball Boot Camp 2017

There is no crying in boot camp. Suck it up camper...

The second Suncoast Pickleball Boot Camp will be held in Montreat, NC (near Asheville) September 24-29. It features Top Professional Instructors/Players as Gigi LeMaster, Robert & Jodi Elliott, Deb Harrison, Steve Kennedy, Phil Bagley and Hendersonville, North Carolina's own Paul Coletta!!! 

Register at: suncoastpickleball.com

Oh, as of this writing, there were only 23 spots left!

The 2016 Boot Camp was a tremendous success based on comments from local attendees and the newspaper article I posted last year.

Sarah Ansboury Clinic

Play until you get better....

Sarah Ansboury is coming to Connestee Falls for a clinic and private lessons May 13-15. Readers of this blog know that she is highly regarded as a teacher as well as a player. If you have any interest, please do not wait as this opportunity will close fast.

Beginner Pickleball

Experts start as beginners...

I recently have been filling in for a fellow ambassador giving beginner-to-intermediate clinics. This week I will begin a series of articles on drills, but today's post will use the newest RV Pickler article to kick off the keys to teaching beginner pickleball. It will help readers to understand why the drills are placed in the order I chose as well as their points of emphasis.

Pickleball 101: Start at the NVZ Line

Golf instructors will tell you, “If you want to teach a new player the game start at the hole”. The same goes for pickleball 101, start at the NVZ line.

Pickleball 101: Safety

Many pickleball clubs, facilities, and groups have created programs to introduce pickleball to new players. The Villages has one of the most robust. With over 75 volunteer instructors offering at least one class per week in the off-season and at least five classes per week in-season, this program introduces about 5,000 seniors each year to the game of pickleball.

Pickleball Summit - Asheville

Push yourself to the limit...

2016 saw the debut of the Pickleball Summit, an opportunity for us regular folks to play and lean from some of the top players and coaches in the game. Two Pickleball Summits were held last year in Charlotte and Indianapolis. I'm happy to say that this year's spring Summit will be held locally at Xcel Sports Complex between Hendersonville and Asheville. Click on the icon below to go to the website. The overview is shown below the icon.

Don't miss the February Special: Bring A Partner For HALF-PRICE!

Imagine The Perfect Pickleball Weekend...

You start with a little open play to get the blood pumping, shots humming, and banter flowing with pickleball players from around the country.

Then, step onto the court with National Champion Matthew Blom, who gives you his inside secrets, personalized feedback, and a champion's insights into your game. Matthew's Zen-Master, Inner Game of Pickleball approach is guaranteed to have you playing at your peak.

Are You Willing to Work?

Part 4 of our series on clinic views has another article from Sarah Ansboury in the RV Pickler blog called Getting the Most From Your Pickleball Lesson. Sarah explains that the benefits from a lesson are maximized only if they are practiced after the lesson. The commitment to improve extends well past the time spent with an instructor.

Getting the Most From Your Pickleball Lesson

This week I was teaching a pickleball lesson and I kept hearing over and over “I’ll never get that overhead smash because I don’t come from tennis”. I’m also told, “I don’t know how to hit groundstrokes because I never played tennis”. The list goes on and on. We all know a lot of the top players came from tennis. And yes it is an easier transition having experience with a racket in your hand. But if there is one thing I hate to hear is “I can’t”. The reality is anyone can! You just need a little instruction and the right kind of instruction. The great thing about pickleball is it’s such an easy sport to learn. And as we continue to play, our love for the game only grows.

One Thing at a Time

Part 3 of our series discussing a range of thoughts about pickleball clinics comes from Sarah Ansboury in an article titled Pickleball Clinics, Rights and Wrongs. When I give pickleball advice - both here and in clinics - I try to couch that advice with the qualifier that there is a generlly accepted technique and then there is the technique that works for you. In other words, the best way for most is not the best way for all. Sarah seems to agree with this article.

Pickleball Clinics, Rights and Wrongs

Have you ever come away from pickleball clinics confused? When I started playing pickleball, people told me all the things I was supposed to do. I held my paddle in ready position, as I do in tennis, and I was told that was wrong. I was told not to hit a backhand, “You want to run around it, and hit more forehands.”

Context Matters

This is the second of a short series of articles on teaching clinics and drills. This post will feature another article from Mark Renneson called Context-Based Coaching.

Context-Based Coaching

Have you ever taken a lesson (in pickleball or anything else), felt really good about your progress and then failed miserably when trying to apply your new skills in a game? This can be a frustrating and even demoralizing situation and very often it stems from a simple coaching mistake: the failure to contextualize the skills being learned.

How do you hit a good volley? That's a reasonable question that a pickleball or tennis player might ask. But before answering the question, the coach should ask one of her own: which volley are we talking about? Are we discussing volleying when the ball is driven hard right at you (e.g. when playing bangers)? Or are we talking about playing a volley when the ball is slow and high? What if it is a volley off an opponent's third shot drop or dink and is now below net level?

Teaching Pickleball

I have mentioned in past posts that I am in the process of becoming a certified instructor through the IPTPA. I have been researching clinic and drill teaching methods and have discovered that there are plenty of opinions out there. Over the next several days, I will share some of these thoughts in preparation for future drill days at Crosswalk as I discussed in Deep, Deep, Drop, Dink. We will start with some ideas from the instructor perspective and move toward ideas from the student perspective. The first comes from Mark Renneson in an article called Teaching Pickleball to Beginners: 6 Do’s and 5 Don’ts for the First 20 Minutes.

Teaching Pickleball to Beginners: 6 Do’s and 5 Don’ts for the First 20 Minutes

As community centres, athletic clubs and local schools look to jump on the pickleball bandwagon, more and more people are providing organized instruction for new players. Here’s a quick guide as to how you can spend the first 20 minutes in a way that is safe, fun and effective. 

Boot Camp

The Suncoast Pickleball Boot Camp was held in the mountains of North Carolina several weeks ago. Many local players attended and all reports were that it was very successful. Below is an article from the Black Mountain News about the clinic. I have added several photos from Facebook posts with local players.

A simpler game of tennis? Not pickleball

Nearly 100 people attend camp for fast-growing sport

(Photo: Fred McCormick)

The hollow sound of pickleballs bouncing off the courts at the Patricia Cornwell Tennis Center echoed through Montreat last week during the Suncoast Pickleball Boot Camp.

The event, which brought top professional instructors and players from the sport to the Montreat Conference Center, was a success according to organizer Russell Elefterion.

"This is a boot camp for players rated 3.5 and above," Elefterion said. "This is the first boot camp I've done, and it sold out in a month."

The camp attracted 84 players and seven pros, attesting to the sport's growing popularity.

Deb Harrison Clinic comes to NC

North Carolina Pickleball

Deb Harrison

North Carolina Pickleball is pleased to announce that we are bringing Deb Harrison to the Charlotte area. The date will be on Friday November 18th at Carolina Courts in Concord NC.

Registration coming soon at www.pickleballtournaments.com    Call 757-685-5909 for clinic information or email ncpickleball@aol.com    

Pickleball Summit - Indianapolis

Back in April, I wrote about a great opportunity to play with and be coached by some of the top players in the game at a Pickleball Summit in Charlotte. Several local players attended and the reviews of the experience were outstanding. For those who missed that event or those who want to repeat the experience, opportunity knocks again with a second Pickleball Summit - this time in Indianapolis in October. Click on the icon below to go to the website. The overview is shown below the icon.

Imagine The Perfect Pickleball Day...