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Tanglewood Pickles Competition

Brian Gjurgevich, Highlands Today

Rich Donald (right) returns a shot while teammate Al Goldberg looks on Friday during Tanglewood Pickleball Club's Heartland Senior Games Pickleball event in Sebring.

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By BRIAN GJURGEVICH

Highlands Today

Published: March 11, 2009

SEBRING - The Tanglewood Pickleball Club signed up its 100th member last week, an impressive figure considering its enrollment less than two years ago.

"We had eight players in 2007," said Wayne Roswell, a Tanglewood resident and pickleball tournament director for the Heartland Senior Games. "When we met with the owner here, he asked us if anyone would be interested in playing pickleball.

"I told him, 'if you build it, we'll find the players.' "

Nearly 100 players and as many spectators gathered this weekend for The Tanglewood Pickleball Club's event, a Heartland Senior Games event and the first such tournament in Florida ever sanctioned by the United States Pickleball Association.

Players from as near as The Villages and as far away as Michigan and Canada took to the sun-drenched courts, and Tanglewood fared well, winning 20 of the 36 medals, including eight golds and seven silvers.

"A club less than two years old dominating the tournament against clubs such as The Villages that have 104 courts and Solivata that have been around much longer was a total success," Roswell said. "Player domination and volunteer teamwork made it happen."

One of the hardest-fought and exciting matches of the tournament was the men's 60-64 category between Tanglewood's top team, Rich Donald and Al Goldberg, and the state champions from Michigan, Patrick McPhail and Jack Licata.

"That is the toughest match I have ever played," Goldberg said after he and Donald prevailed in a third-game tiebreaker to win gold. "I gave my whole body to that one."

Roswell said the sport's come a long way over the past few years, growing bigger as more folks are exposed to the game. The tournament even has a fitting sponsor - the Mt. Olive Pickle Company.

"I was up at a tournament in North Carolina and it was part of a pickle festival," Roswell said. "We got there and there were no courts, so we put nets up, paced off the distances and drew lines with chalk and used porta-potties as barriers.

"This," he said as he looked at the bustling courts teeming with players and spectators, "is the real thing."

Roswell said the sport is big in Tanglewood, which had eight courts running for the tourney, and that the tournament separates itself from other, sometimes more-attended tourneys through its quality play and officiating.

"We had to train refs, which isn't easy because the rules are very specific and the scoring can be confusing," Roswell said. "The Villages has the Senior Master Games, which is a big one, but this is a USAPA-approved tournament with refs, and they don't have that."

For more information on the Heartland Senior Games, visit http://www.southflorida.edu/academic/commed/hsg.as....

The Highlands Today sports department can be reached at 863-386-5841 or sports@highlandstoday.com.

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