Parksville Oceanside Pickleball Society

Sunday Update for 5-Jul-2026

I hope that everybody had a safe and enjoyable Canada Day this week and got out to enjoy a lot of the lovely weather for pickleball this week!

The numbers for the Hugh and Elaine Bohm Dinking Tournament are going up slowly. We currently have 47 people signed up and we are looking for 64! If you have not signed up yet, ask around and ask others their experience with the tournament. It is a lot of fun!

With the Canada Day holiday, I have not heard any further news on the Lacrosse Box work. I keep hoping it will move forward soon.

This week, I received a newsletter which included the 24 Pickleball Principles. I have included it below as something to ponder about the game of pickleball.

See you on the courts!

Sean

24 Pickleball Principles

Pickleball Basics (“General” principles – these are not rules but guidelines toward developing a mindset for the game of pickleball.)

By John C. Stennfeld – Certified PPR Teaching Professional and DUPR Coach

1. He who controls the net controls the point.
2. More points are lost by bad shots than won by good shots.
3. The baseline is where points are lost.
4. The nvz line (kitchen line) is where points are won.
5. Low shots win points; high shots lose points.
6. When you consider lobbing, don’t! (exception, principle #24)
7. Pickleball is a game of attrition, not demolition.
8. Dink cross, attack straight.
9. If you dink or volley-drop while your opponents are at the baseline (and you are at the kitchen), dink/drop cross, not straight.
10. Keep your opponent at the baseline whenever possible; DO NOT bring them to the kitchen.
11. Angles increase the size of the court your opponent must cover, but also increase the parts of the court you must cover.
12. Angles create angles.
13. An out ball is better than an easy ball (so don’t hit out balls just because you can).
14. Hitting around people is better than at/through people.
15. Never hit harder than you can control.
16. 100% of your power is rarely, if ever, needed.
17. Serving is intended to start the point, not win the point.
18. The two most important shots never to miss are the return, and the serve, and in that order.
19. Your probability of winning the point is inversely proportional to the height of your shots. (The name of the game is "keep the ball low.")
20. Your probability of winning will go up as you learn to control (what I call) the 4 p's of pickleball - placement of your shots, power of your strokes, positioning on the court, and pace of play.
21. When you charge hard, go soft! (When you charge hard toward the kitchen to get a dropped ball, you must go soft with your shot to keep the ball low and slow.
22. When you go wide to retrieve an angled shot that is not angled enough for you to ATP, your shot needs to be cross-court and not to your opponent who is in front of you.
23. When you and your partner are at the baseline, and a deep shot is hit to you that forces you to move backwards beyond the baseline, do not drive the ball back to your opponents; drop it into the kitchen, preferably with a loopy drop, to allow yourself to get back into the court and positioned to move forward once again.
24. Lob to buy time to get back into a point when you are on the defensive (high lob), lob offensively when your opponents are moving in rapidly or leaning in at the kitchen.

Sunday Update for 28-Jun-2026

First, to remind everyone, there is no pickleball on Wednesday, 1-Jul-2026, due to the Canada Day events in the park.

Sign up for the Hugh and Elaine Bohm Dinking Tournament is going well. We have 38 people signed up and looking for 64. This is a very fun tournament as it is all about dinking! And I know we can ALL use some work on our dinking games! If you have not participated, ask around. This is a fun and challenging tournament. Who knew dinking could be so hard.

The sign up for Set Up for July is up here. Since we have sessions at the end of all the sessions right now, we have eliminated the sign up for Take Down. We know that many of you in the sessions already help to take down. We do ask that before you leave, if you can, to make sure the person putting away the equipment is not left alone. The cart is heavy and they might need some help.

If you have not done Set Up or Take Down, just offer to help and tell the people you have not done it before and people will be glad to help show you. For Set Up, set up starts at 8am, so just show up at that time and you can get some extra play time in after everything is set up.

A few fun things happening in the near future. Tuesday, if you are participating in Ladies Play, this will be a pre-Canada Day Celebration! So come dressed! Even if you are not in Ladies Play, play in social before Ladies Play in your Canada Day attire!

Also, on Tuesday, 7-Jul, the Social Committee is having coffee and donuts during Social Play so come out and enjoy some treats and drinks during play.

Sunday Update for 14-Jun-2026

It was good to see all the people at the Welcome to Summer Tournament yesterday with players from both OPC and POPS. From the people I have talked with, everybody had a wonderful time and the weather was amazing! If you did not participate this year, you should consider playing next year. It is a fun team event!

Mairi has asked me to tell Ladies' Players that Tuesday, 30-Jun-2026, will be a Pre-Canada Day Dress Up Day for Ladies' Play with Elbows up and show your Red and White! Parade! Prizes! Fun!

No additional updates on the Lacrosse Box work. We are planning to play through the end of June as things stand right now.

Sunday Update for 7-Jun-2026

Just a reminder that there is no POPS play next Saturday as we are working with OPC to host the "Welcome to Summer Tournament". If you have not signed up, pop down to the park next Saturday morning and cheer on your fellow players as they play in teams of eight against other teams of players mixed from OPC and POPS.

Last week we changed our competitive play to kings court format and it seemed to go well. We have a full house of people participating and from the people that I talked to they all enjoyed the format. So, if you are interested, sign up and check it out.

I heard from the city this week. There has not been any updates from the archaeologist at this time. So, it looks like at this point we will be outdoor until the end of June.

Hope to see you on the courts!

Sean

Sunday Update for 31-May

Some of you may have noticed that we are changing our Competitive Play to Kings Court. Kings Court is a dynamic and exciting format that rewards consistency, adaptability, and competitive play — perfect for experienced players looking for a real challenge.

Here's how it works: players are randomly split across multiple courts with the objective to stay on your original court for the entire session — the King of the Court. After each game, winners stay on their court, split up, and are paired with new partners for the next match. Losers rotate down one court. The goal is simple: keep winning on your original court.

What makes it compelling is that you're never playing with the same partner twice in a row. You have to win with whoever you're paired with, which means you can't rely on a single teammate — you need to bring your own game every match. It tests every part of your pickleball: shot-making, communication, adaptability, and composure under pressure.

It's fast-moving, social between games, and intensely competitive when it counts. If you've been looking for a session that actually pushes you, Kings Court is it.

We hope that you will come out this Wednesday and give it a try.

One of our members took her time to put the name tags in alphabetical order and take a picture of them. Here they are for you to check if yours is there.

Thank you Wendy Shaw!

Finally, there are not updates from the city, so we will be starting out play outdoors in June!

Sean

Sunday Update for 24-May-2026

Lacrosse Box Update. I heard from the city this week and they are currently working through "some archeological issues". They did not give me any more details than that, but are hoping the construction will start in early June and will try and give us as much notice as possible before starting the work.

With that in mind, here is the sign up for Set Up and Take Down for June.

We were looking at the status of our nets this week and noticed would ask that when you take down a net that you loosen the net before pulling it out of the base. We have noticed that many of the nets are still tight when putting them back up and worried that is it causing undo stress on the nets and ripping them prematurely. Thank you!

Sunday Update for 26-Apr-2026

First some news on the Lacrosse Box work. Some of you may have noticed on Wednesday the city was walking around the Lacrosse Box talking about the work with the contractor. The city came over and talk to one of our board members after the meeting and indicated they are waiting on an archaeologist report because this site might have sacred importance. The report is required before the contractor can start work. There is currently no timeline on when the city will receive the report.

We will be starting out scheduled play on the week of 4-May-2026 and it looks like we will still be outdoors, but we are trying to get a confirmation from the RDN, who provides the permit for us to use the Lacrosse Box. The Curling Club is being flexible on when we start playing indoors in their facility and we are grateful to them.

To prepare for playing in the Curling Club, we are looking for a few volunteers to help set up the nets and fences in the Curling Club on Wednesday, 29-Apr-2026, starting at 10am. If you can help, please reply to this message.

If you are a new member of POPS and ordered a name tag, it has arrived! Name tags will be available during Morning Play.

Finally, some of you may have noticed that recent emails from me have landed in your spam or junk folder. We've recently switched to a new email address, president@pops.club, and while we've done everything on our end to make sure our emails are properly authenticated, spam filters can still behave unpredictably — even for people using the same email provider like Gmail or Hotmail.

This is completely normal when a new email address hasn't yet built up a reputation with email providers. It doesn't mean anything is wrong.

To make sure you don't miss any club communications, please take 30 seconds to do the following:

1. Check your spam or junk folder for any recent emails from president@pops.club.
2. If you find one, open it and mark it as "Not Spam" (or "Not Junk").
3. Add president@pops.club to your contacts or safe senders list.

These steps will train your email provider to trust president@pops.club going forward.

If you have any questions or aren't sure how to do this for your specific email app, just reply to this message and we'll help you out.

Thank you for your patience as we get settled in with the new address!

Set Up and Take Down for April

Please keep an eye on the set up and take down schedule for April. It is located here. We have several times where there is nobody to set up or take down, like tomorrow.

Sunday Update for 19-Apr-2026

No updates from the city yet on the work for the Lacrosse Box. We are moving forward with working with the Curling Club and coming up with the schedule for our play starting the week of 4-May. The schedule will look very similar to what we had last year with the addition of two courts set aside for Men's Play on the days we have Gentle Play. On a plus note, when we are in the curling club, we will have eight courts instead of six courts in the Lacrosse Box, which will allow us to increase the number of players for each session.

We are looking for some help with some of the things we do as a club. We would like help with the following:

• A volunteer coordinator, or two - This person will make sure we have volunteers for sessions, set up, and take down and notify me if something needs to be cancelled due to lack of volunteers, or we need to call out for volunteers.
• A tournament committee - This committee will help coordinate and run the tournaments we have scheduled for this year.
• A social committee - This committee with coordinate and run any social events we want to have. In the past we have done a bowling and pizza afternoon, but we can do more if we have a group of people willing to coordinate events.

If you are interested or have questions about the opportunities to volunteer, please let me know.

Have a good week and I hope to see you on the courts!

Sean

Annual General Meeting Tomorrow (Saturday) Morning

This is a friendly reminder about our Annual General Meeting tomorrow.

POPS Annual General Meeting
Date: Saturday, 11-Apr-2026
Time: 10am to 12pm

Location:
Parksville Community Centre (near Starbucks)
223 Mills St.
Parksville

I hope to see you there!

Annual General Meeting Date and Location

A few people have asked where the Annual General Meeting (AGM) is being held and I realized I forgot to put it in my Sunday message.

Annual General Meeting

Date: Saturday, 11-Apr-2026

Time: 10am to 12pm

Location:

Parksville Community Centre (near Starbucks)

223 Mills St.

Parksville

Thanks to those who asked where it was.

Sunday Update for 5-Apr-2026

Our Annual General Meeting (AGM) is next Saturday, 11-Apr-2026, at 10 until 12. There is no pickleball scheduled for next Saturday so people can attend the AGM. The meeting minutes from last year's AGM and the agenda for this year's AGM are attached.

Outdoor play has started for the year! Friday was our first day on the courts and Saturday was a lovely sunny day. I hope people are able to get out this week and play. Reminder that morning play is Social Play from 9am until 11:30am Monday through Saturday.

I hope to see many of you on the courts and at the AGM next Saturday.

Sean

Court Location

Lacrosse box, Parksville Community Park