community

PALA Pickleball, the largest indoor pickleball club in Texas, uses member rankings to create fun and competitive play. Having just opened in October 2022, the Houston-based club has found tremendous success in welcoming all ranks to play on PALA’s 11 state of the art, professional courts. Kaitlyn Myers, Chief Operating Officer, has been told that, “when you walk into PALA, it’s electric.” A lot of its success stems from their “Open Play” design which allows players of all levels to engage in healthy competition. PALA’s Open Play lasts for three hours, twice a day, and the courts are set up for rating skill level. The back three courts are for beginners to 3.0, then 3.5 to 4.0, and so on. This structure ensures that each person is matched with a suitable opponent. Myers says, “there are thousands of players that come in every week, so it can be tricky to know everyone’s individual rankings, but we are very familiar with our 600 members and where they stand.” PALA’s instructors can also easily tell a player’s skill level just based on a couple of games, and they can provide “instructor ratings” to players if asked