For the rapidly decreasing number of Americans who've never heard of pickleball, the obscure paddleball game is America's fastest growing sport for the second year in a row.
Invented in 1965 by three middle-aged fathers in Washington state, pickleball is a quirky cross between tennis, ping pong and badminton, played with a paddle and a perforated plastic ball. The founders are said to have named the game after a family dog called Pickles.
With 4.8 million people now playing—almost double the number from just five years ago, according to the Sports and Fitness Industry Association — some of the sport's devotees are capitalizing on pickleball's spike in popularity.
Most of pickleball's core players—those who play more than eight times per year—are over age 65, but the game is getting younger, with the strongest growth among players under 55, according to USA Pickleball.
But with so many new players, the US is struggling to keep up with demand for courts.
The country has only about ten thousand places to play, by USA Pickleball's count, but that continues to grow by several dozen every month. Sports clubs and hotel groups, including Marriott and Omni Resorts, are converting tennis courts or purpose-building new courts for pickleball, while a restaurant chain called Chicken N' Pickle that has locations in four states has said it will double its footprint within the next year.
Municipalities nationwide are also trying to meet the demand for pickleball venues—so many that USA Pickleball is putting together a "toolkit" for community planners with guidelines and cost estimates for building new courts, which can range from $300 for a temporary net, equipment and tape to mark lines, to $30,000 for a permanent court.
(NPR)