2018 AAU National Indoor Pickleball Championships

ORLANDO, Fla (August 24, 2018) - The inaugural AAU National Indoor Pickleball Championships were held August 13-19, 2018 in Orlando, Florida at the Orlando Sports Center. 

The sport of pickleball is relatively new to the AAU having been introduced to the Union in 2017.  Starting with one (1) AAU membership, it now boasts more than 500 members and is rapidly growing. Members primarily hail from the state of Florida though the New England AAU district hosted a couple invitational tournaments in June 2018.

"I actually did another AAU tournament in April and that was at my home court," said Shayla McDonald, age 22 of Seminole, Florida  "So that’s when I actually joined AAU. I still had my membership, so I was like I'm just going to do this tournament too. It’s been fun."

McDonald first got involved in the sport after an injury to her dad:  "I got into it when my dad got injured playing tennis, to be honest. I'm 22. When I started, you know there's a lot of older people, not a lot of young people so I didn't really catch on to it at first, but once I did, I got addicted. I started playing every day and then I was trying to find more places to play. So I mean, I just started catching on."

Participants at this year's AAU indoor nationals ranged from the 2.5 to 5.0 skill levels and from 12 to 80 years of age. 

Patrice Lui, hailing from Davenport, Florida, along with her husband Patrick also came out for a chance to capture a national championship.

"It's indoor and close by us, 35 minutes," said. Patrice Lui, age 60. " We like to play indoor tournaments. This is a beautiful facility and we came by to make sure we got to experience it."

For many, pickleball is the chance have continued competition opportunities.  

"One of things I like most about pickleball and why I kind of transitioned from another sport to this one was because when was the last time you were able to go to the park and do a bunch of pick-up games," said Jonathan Andrews, age 31 of Bonita Springs, Florida. "You know what I mean? So, there’s always people to play and the sport is growing." 

For more on pickleball, visit aaupickleball.org