| Status: | Active, open to new members |
| Contact: | |
| When: | Weekly on Friday afternoons 3:00 pm-5:00 pm In the main sports hall of the Hart Leisure Centre |
| Venue: | Hart leisure centre |
| Cost: | Between £5 & £7 per session for those committing to pay in advance for each block of sessions. A single Taster session costs £7.50 |
We have had an established Pickleball group within the Odiham and District u3a since September 2023.
We play every week at the Everyone Active Hart Leisure Centre (EA/HLC), on Friday afternoons between 3pm & 5pm.
We now have 40+ members playing regularly, the majority weekly and some fortnightly.
As a result of the rapid growth of the group I have put a hold on new members joining the group and will create a wait list for folk who want to join and play on a regular basis.
I will continue to offer Taster sessions but these may be outside of the normal playing times.
"So, what", I hear you say, "is pickleball"? Well, it's a hybrid sport that combines the skills and agility of table tennis, tennis, and badminton but without having to run around quite so much. It's played on a badminton court with a net slightly lower than a tennis court net and it uses "Paddles" and air-flow balls. The Paddles have a short (5 inch) tennis racquet style handle attached to a double-sided rectangular head (about 7 inches x 9 inches) and are typically made of a carbon fibre or polymer honeycomb core and carbon fibre or fibreglass hard playing surfaces. The airflow balls are hard plastic about the same size as a tennis ball.
Our group aims for inclusivity and enjoyment over out-and-out competitiveness, so we play as doubles pairs, mixing up players with different abilities and switching partners between games.
Pickleball is the fastest-growing sport in the USA, and it's growing in popularity here in the UK too, with around 35,000 people playing and a growth rate of 65% in 2024.
If you've played some sort of racquet/bat/ball game before the concept is quite similar, although there are a few basic rules to learn. So, if you want to give Pickleball a go we can offer a one-off Taster session, where you'll be given basic instructions in the game and have the opportunity to play. The Taster sessions cost £7.50; the fee covering the cost of paddle and court hire at the Hart Leisure Centre. Afterwards, folk can decide if they want to continue playing on a regular basis in which case you would pay for the remaining sessions of the term, on a pro-rated basis. This should work out at between £5 and £7 per session, depending on the number of regular players attending.
If you are interested in joining the group or in taking part a Taster session, then contact the group by email by clicking on the Group Contact Name above.