New Year's Resolutions

                                            Will She Hit A Placement Or Power Shot?

Our Paso Robles Pickleball Club Website:  www.pickleballpasorobles.shutterfly.com  Join us for Pickleball anytime you are visiting the Central Coast of California.  Paso Robles was recently named the 2013 "Wine Region Of The Year" by Wine Enthusiast Magazine.  Pickleball and wine tasting.  Nice way to spend the New Year!

Albert Einstein once said "it is a form of insanity to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect different results."  Hmmmm.....sound familiar?  You are six months....nine months....a year....into playing Pickleball, still swinging away, still trying that service ace, still playing a power game, still neglecting the short game, still losing against the better players....and still expecting that your game will produce different results.  Time to make some changes.  Time to set some 2014 Pickleball resolutions.

Ever heard of 'living backwards?'  This is a goal-setting technique (let's look at it in terms of Pickleball) whereby you decide what kind of game you want to be playing in 3-6 months.  Set some goals:  (1) more consistent placement of serve; (2) better, softer return of serve that allows you to get to the net; (3) less power game, better placement game; (4) better, more patient short (dink) game; (5) better understanding of positioning on the court; (6) better communication with partner.  OK, you get the idea.  NOW, move back in time to the present and decide what is is you need to do every time you play to achieve these goals.  Sounds easy, but if it were easy, everybody would be good.  1% daily improvement over a hundred days....not 100% improvement in one day.  There's that patience thing again.

Start with fundamentals.  Get to the courts a little earlier and work on your game.  Decide what you are going to work on and do so while playing.  Fundamentals, fundamentals, fundamentals....without them, the fancy stuff is not going to work.

Improvement comes by choice, not chance.