The Winamac Town Park’s new pickleball courts are proving to be a success. During last week’s park board meeting, board member Jon Chapman said there’s been a lot of interest. “We’ve got a guy that’s willing to do lessons twice a week for free, one on a Saturday, once after work,” Chapman said. “We’ve got somebody that wants to run a league already. We’ve got people that are talking about doing a mixed doubles night.”
Due to their popularity so far, Chapman suggested designating one court for beginners and the other one for more advanced players. “One’s going to say, ‘Social Court,’ and then underneath that, it will be like, ‘No aggressive play,'” he explained. “The other one will say, ‘Competition Court.’ So beginners can show up, and if they’re watching, they can go, ‘I’m going to go over here and play with these people because I’m not ready to play with those animals over there,’ because we’ve got varying degrees. There’s some people that have played for a few years.”
He said that the signs will be donated and installed at no cost to the town. The rest of the park board voted to allow the installation of the signs to move forward.
Meanwhile, Park Board President Courtney Poor was already looking toward expanding the facility. “We really didn’t know how this was going to go, and the report that I’m hearing is ‘Are two pickleball courts enough?'”
Chapman responded, “I would say let’s let the future tell us that, but my inclination is the answer’s going to be ‘No.'”
Chapman did notice that some rust was starting to form on the new pickleball surface. Park Manager Dave DeLorenzo didn’t believe it was an issue with the coating, since similar rust stains appear on the tennis courts. Still, board member Brad Zellers suggested double checking with the installer. The installation of the pickleball courts experienced several delays over the past year, before they finally opened last month.
