I want to start by saying how proud I am of what this community put together over the past few months, from busy summers at clubs across the province to a competitive season that brought Nationals to Ontario.
Last year, our tournament season was Provincials and nothing else. This year, we added a Regional series ahead of it, in Kingston and in Cambridge, with a Golden Ticket into Provincials for the winners. Not everything we planned went ahead, and we will take those lessons into next year. A great deal of that work was Christine Kelly’s. She built the Regional series from the ground up as our Tournament Chair and set a standard the next person will have to live up to. Having brought it this far, she has decided it is time to pass it on, so we are now looking for someone to take up the role and carry it forward.
Then the national championship came to Toronto, and the Provincial Team Competition was hosted in Ontario for the first time. With Nationals close to home, many of our players got to compete at a national championship without the cost and travel of leaving the province. Our volunteers are the reason it all ran so smoothly, and Team Ontario came home with silver.
None of it happens without support either. Franklin Pickleball, TSS Pickleball and MoveBuddy stood behind us through the season, and we are pleased to welcome CBI Health as our newest partner.
Now we turn to the fall, and your Pickleball Ontario board is building its plan for the year ahead.
We are also looking for people. Pickleball Ontario runs entirely on volunteers. We need a Tournament Chair to take on the biggest tournament in the province. We need clubs represented on the Club Advisory Council. And if you have a passion for pickleball and want to get more involved, you don’t need board experience to start. We have volunteer roles where you can work alongside our operational board, learn how it runs and see whether it’s something you’d like to be part of down the road. If that sounds like you, get in touch.
Jonathon Moody
President, Pickleball Ontario