I wanted a stereotypical LA hobby to pick up. Something you could only do here, or at least was better to do here than other places.

Beach volleyball and surfing fit the bill for the former — I’ll probably try beach volleyball at some point but don’t have the balance to surf. And tennis, pickleball, and cycling fit for the latter.

Tennis had become my main secondary sport behind basketball in early last year, so I leaned further into that my first few months here. But as I took an extended break from basketball, I was ready to promote tennis to my primary sport and began to look for a new secondary sport.

And soon after I passed by a group playing beach tennis in Santa Monica’s Ocean Park neighborhood.

What is beach tennis?

I describe beach tennis to friends as, roughly, badminton played with a soft tennis ball with a pickleball paddle on a beach volleyball court.

Here’s a video showing some example gameplay.

The sport was originally created by Italian tennis players on vacation, and has become quite popular in Brazil.

Whereas I don’t find the actual sport of pickleball very engaging, I have found beach tennis is a lot more fun to play. You’re moving a lot more, it’s easy to pick up, and my serve translated seamlessly from tennis.

Ola

I wanted to shout out Ola, who runs the beach tennis open play that I go to. They’ve created a super fun environment to play in and the people that run it seem super nice. It’s also great to see how on top of their act they are — it seems like every week they are introducing new classes, events, custom equipment, or brand partnerships and seem to iterate on feedback very quickly. Good on them!

I participated in their summer league, ultimately finishing 2nd in the playoffs for my league (granted, beginner division) in a nail-biter. I’m getting my first matches of the fall league in tomorrow.

So thanks Ola! It’s been fun picking up beach tennis these last few months.