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11/07/2018 07:21 AMAt the Nov. 1, ribbon-cutting ceremony for three new outdoor pickleball courts in Main Street Connection Park, First Selectman Carl Fortuna, Jr.’s statement that it was the most quickly completed municipal project in town history was nearly upstaged by another announcement: A romance that started on the pickleball courts will soon result in a wedding.
Ines Granville and Paul Thomson, both 75, actually met playing pickleball as part of the town’s Parks & Recreation program. He had a cough and she offered him a lozenge.
“We were both widows,” he said. “We’ve been together now for not quite two years.”
Thomson seized the occasion of the ribbon cutting to ask Fortuna, who is a justice of the peace, to officiate at their wedding. Fortuna was delighted to accept.
It’s clear pickleball is not just a pastime, but a near-obsession for some residents. Granville used to play tennis, and now plays pickleball nearly every day.
“The crowd and the people are wonderful,” she said. “And I think we are having a really good time. For our age this is a perfect activity, the social part and the physical part.
Pickleball is as strenuous as you make it, Granville said.
“There are different levels. There are people used to be very good tennis players. Now there is something much, much easier for them. I was one,” she said.
“I’m getting ready for a hip operation," Thomson added. "I have to take it easy or my surgeon will be very unhappy.”
Well Ahead of Schedule
The courts were not expected to open to the public until spring 2019.
The ribbon cutting took place on an unseasonably warm autumn day; dried leaves adorned the brightly painted courts. About 20 people turned out for the occasion, including Fortuna, Parks & Recreation Director Ray Allen, Finance Director Lee Ann Palladino, and a host of pickleball enthusiasts, including Kathy Coogan, who had the honor of cutting the ribbon.
Coogan is the resident who got the pickleball rolling. Coogan previously bowled once a week with her friends at the Old Saybrook bowling alley and, when that closed in 2014, went in search of a new sport. Having encountered pickleball in Florida, where she spends part of the year, she approached the Parks & Rec about offering it in Old Saybrook.
Parks & Rec Assistant Director Jonathan Paradis inaugurated an eight-week program, whereby three courts were set up in the gym once a week from 9:30 to 11 a.m. For $10 for each eight-week session, pre-registered residents could show up and play. The program continues to this day, only it now meets two mornings a week, on Mondays and Thursdays. It still costs $10 ($15 for non-residents) for an eight-week session and runs from September through June. A Saturday morning program has been added.
While the program was originally designed for seniors, adults of various ages began to show interest. Now, any adult resident is welcome to sign up.
Old Saybrook’s avid pickleballers felt they needed more courts and more time to play, however, so on July 10, about 25 of them attended a Board of Selectmen meeting to show their support for outdoor courts, though none would have guessed the proposal would come to fruition less than four months later.
Further improvements are in store.
“I’m working on windscreens around the fencing,” Allen announced at the ribbon cutting. “We’ll have some benches put in. Eventually, we’ll have a porta-potty over here, just in case. We’ll have a water fountain eventually because we have all those hookups,” he said.
As the courts are in a public park, use will be on a first-come, first-play basis. Parks & Rec will not be taking reservations, Allen said.
Additional programs are being planned that will make use of the new courts, including a pickleball league, Paradis said.
Fortuna announced that the courts are already set up with lighting conduits and that the contractor has lights ready to go. Further funding is needed, but the town may put it in next year’s budget or raise the funds, he said.
Fortuna requested that those using the courts make sure to use the sidewalk and gravel paths to access them, for safety reasons as well as to preserve the grass the town is growing between the parking lot and the courts. Each pickleball court has its own separate gate and the gravel path runs the entire length.
“It’s an awesome downtown recreational activity for our residents but also for people who visit our town,” Fortuna said. “And that’s part of the point: to get people down here, visiting downtown Old Saybrook, going out for lunch after they play pickleball. I’m really happy we made it happen. I want to thank Ray [Allen]. Ray really brought this to our attention.”