PICKLEBALL & LIFE EXPECTANCY

Pickleball & Life Expectancy, DUPR is Acquired, The Skinny on The Skinny

Author

FIT PICKLER
February 01, 2024

Health, Fitness, News & Fun for Picklers of All Ages

What's Cooking in the Kitchen This Week:

  • Fitness Expert Glen Dawson: Good Morning Mobility Stretches

  • Does Pickleball Increase Your Life Expectancy?

  • Andre Agassi and Investors Acquire Controlling Interest in DUPR

  • The 7 Shots You Need To Master To Up Your Game

  • $1M Pickleball SLAM 2: McEnroe/Sharapova vs. Agassi/Graf

  • Learn The Skinny about Skinny Singles

  • Rally Rundown: Local Highlights

  • Coach Mary: 2024 Rules Recap, Lobs & Explosive Serves

 đźŹ‹ď¸Ź STAYING FIT with GLEN

MORNING MOBILITY STRETCHES

⚕️ HEALTH

Does Pickleball Increase Life Expectancy?

In 2018, the Mayo Clinic published a report entitled, “Why a racquet and some friends may be the key to a longer life.” The Co-Director of the Mary Clinic Sports Medicine department, Dr. Ed Laskowski, noted: “The study actually found that the team sports, the sports where you had some social connectivity, actually produced a greater longevity than those individual sports."

While he stated that exercise in general can help extend life, racquet sports are particularly adept at it because of the interval aspect where high periods of intense activity are followed by a period of recovery.

They concluded that playing tennis or badminton increased the life expectancy of participants by 9.7 years and 6.2 years, respectively. Dan Buettner has noted that Pickleball is even better than these!

Buettner is a National Geographic Fellow, award-winning journalist and producer, and New York Times bestselling author and the force behind the Netflix Documentary Blue Zones based on his book, The Blue Zones Secrets for Living Longer: Lessons From the Healthiest Places on Earth.

In an Instagram video, he notes that the social aspect of Pickleball makes the sport even more important to one’s life span than the other racquet sports. Check it out below:

🗞️IN THE NEWS

Andre Agassi and Investors Acquire a Controlling Interest in DUPR

DUPR (Dynamic Universal Pickleball Rating), often referred to as pickleball's most accurate international rating system, has had a controlling interest acquired by tennis legend, Andre Agassi, real estate developer and MLB team owner, David Kass and the Raine Ventures, infusing the organization with an $8 million investment.

DUPR is a proprietary tournament software that is based on the ELO Algorithm which is a method for calculating the relative skill levels of players in zero-sum games such as chess. It takes into account a player’s last 30 singles matches or last 60 doubles matches.

The algorithm considers three factors: How many points did you win? Did you win or lose the game and Was the this a record store, a league match, or an unsanctioned or sanctioned tournament to come up with a rating score?

The income model is based on charging tournaments a percentage of registration fees for use of the software. To learn more about how DUPR works, read here… To read more about the DUPR acquisition, read here…

🥷 SKILL MASTERY

The 7 Shots You Need to Learn
To Up Your Game

While many players associate mastery of these shots with 3.5 levels or above, learning one at a time can level up even the beginner’s game.

The shots include:

  • The Volley Lob (Go over their heads)

  • The Backhand Spin Dink (Force opponent’s errors)

  • The Topspin Roll Volley (Back them up)

  • Th Third Shot Drop (Buy some time)

  • The Erne (Jump and volley)

  • The Backhand Punch (Surprise them with power)

  • The Fake Dink (Sneaky disguised drive)

    To learn how to master and when to use these shots, see here…

🤩 CELEBRITY

SLAM 2: McEnroe/Sharapova vs Agassi/Graf for $1 Million Dollars

Last Spring, Pickleball SLAM 1 featured the largest purse ever offered in a pickleball tournament when Andre Agassi and Andy Roddick faced John McEnroe and Michael Chang. Agassi and Roddick won.

This February 4th, PB SLAM 2 returns to the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Hollywood Florida. You can watch the match on ESPN at 8:30pm EST.

SLAM 2 will feature doubles match featuring the duo of McEnroe and Sharapova, who have a total of 12 Grand Slam singles titles between them, facing off against Agassi and Graf, who earned a combined 30 Grand Slam singles titles during their respective careers. Read more here…

Skinny Singles - Not a Dating Site
But a Great Workout Nonetheless

Most of us learn Pickleball playing doubles and singles matches can seem quite intimidating, and frankly, exhausting!

Pickleball University gives us the breakdown, the Skinny on Skinny Singles if you will, on this popular variation. The popularity of skinny singles has to do with the smaller court size and the need for more precise shots.

It’s a great workout and a great way to improve your skills. Read all about it here…

🧭 COMMUNITY NEWS

RALLY RUNDOWN:
LOCAL HIGHLIGHTS

HOLDING COURT with
COACH MARY

  đź’Ş 2024 Rule Recap and Two Tips:
Lob Etiquette & Explosive Serve Technique

2024 Rule Change Recap

Here is a great video detailing the rule changes from Pickleball Playbook website.

Here are 5 Highlights:

1. Fix it First Referee: If someone is in the wrong court, or it is the incorrect server, the referee will correct this prior to the next point. The team will not be penalized.

2. Degraded, cracked or soft ball – play continues until the end of the rally. A replay can occur if appealed. Watch the video for details.

3. Time outs must be called before the ref or the server starts their motion.

4. The server must call the score prior to starting their serving motion.

5. Skinny singles approved for USA Pickleball sanctioned tourneys.

Two Tips This Week:

Lob Etiquette

One of my students today recently asked me about lob etiquette.

Situations:
1. A team continually lobs to you when you are looking into the sun.
2. A team continually lobs to players who are physically limited in mobility.

Here are some suggestions:

• If the sun is a factor, switch sides at six points so both teams must deal with the sun.

• If a player has mobility issues, be sure to communicate with your partner, telling them to take all the lobs, and you will switch sides.

• Have one partner stay back in the transition zone, rather than coming all the way to the net, so you can cover uber lobbers.

• If you want to keep your opponent from lobbing you constantly, return deep to their backhand!

• One of my students said: “I asked them not to lob to my physically limited partner, and they said, “You are winning.” This would be a good time to tell your partner you will get all the lobs, and to prepare by staying back a bit.

• Ultimately, you should not lob to physically limited players unless you must. They could fall or get hurt. Be a good sport and learn to execute a third shot drop instead.

Here are some lob videos to help you defend and attack with a lob.

Explosive Serve Technique

Check out this video from Ed Ju:
https://youtu.be/7TNfGh9x80o?si=b1cWuKQLDHyh27eZ

Ju asks Jaume Vich to demonstrate an explosive power serve. Jaume uses an open stance, but he really emphasizes the hip turn! Watch the video several times. “The ball goes where the hand goes.”

He shows a short serve, a topspin serve, and the slow motion videos really help you to see his hip turn, his paddle position, and his follow-through.

The consistent part is the hip rotation! Transfer power from the hip to the ball. Note, he follows-through forward, not across the body.

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