The National Pickleball Tournament, hosted by the USAPA, is finally happening soon. It's taken a lot of hard work by a lot of people to get to this point (along with funding by some terrific supporters), and they all deserve a huge round of applause (and your business). Although I'm no longer closely involved with the USAPA, I keep tabs on what's happening via their web site (www.usapa.org) and what I hear locally from others, and this tournament is quite an achievement.

If you can make it out to the courts in early November, I can pretty well guarantee you'll enjoy watching the games. Better yet, sign up to play! They've opened the tournament to all ages, which gives some of our young people their best chance to have some great national competition. All of this is happening November 2-8, 2009, at Sun City Festival in Buckeye, Arizona. The weather should be great (winter in the desert is usually lovely), so come on out and watch some great pickleball.