The name of the sport may turn people off, and so may the stereotype of the target age of the people who generally play it. But that hasn’t stopped the USA Pickleball Association from dubbing the small-court racquet game as one of the fastest growing sports in America.

Pickleball has also been finding sort of a home in Aiken County, given the retirement community as well as the dozens of courts and community centers. Aiken natives Jordan Goetzman and Josh Booth may have taken the first step onto new territory for the sport locally.

Both bankers at Security Federal, Goetzman and Booth got into the sport after they met when Goetzman moved back to his hometown with his family two years ago.

Given their mutual backgrounds in tennis, the transition wasn’t all that difficult, and they want to help continue the expansion of the sport locally.

“We love playing, obviously, and we want it to keep growing,” Booth said. “I’d like to see Aiken get to the point where we tip over the scale of being known for pickleball and drawing more people to come here. We have a pretty good retirement gig already in terms of attracting people and attracting people from all over the country for the weather and the equestrian stuff. If we can throw pickleball in the hat there we can create another drive to keep people coming here.”

Goetzman, 39, played tennis going back to the junior level, and he played at Aiken High and collegiately at the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga, so his experience in the most notable racquet-sport made his transition to the smaller courts and the equipment of pickleball a bit smoother than expected, even with the requirement of learning the contrasting strategies.

“There are a lot of transferrable skills. It’s a racquet sport, ball and net. The strategy of pickleball is somewhat different. I guess you spend a lot of time around the kitchen area, which means no volleys. You do some dinking and try to work some singles and you have to be patient in that area. Like in tennis, more often than not you’re trying to over-power your opponent,” Goetzman said.

The bankers put their skills to the test for the first time at the U.S. Open Pickleball Championships in Naples, Florida last month and took home bronze. Goetzman and Booth finished third together in doubles in the 40-plus age group on April 23. They also competed at the Aiken City Cup, representing Security Federal Bank, on separate teams at H. Odell Weeks Activities Center last week.

With the lack of significant prize money at their level of competition, Goetzman and Booth are currently competing simply for the love of it and the opportunity to stay in shape. Even so, Booth, 41, said facetiously that his goal in mind was to become the best pickleball player in the country, which may not be much of a laughing matter the more experience they acquire and the more success they achieve in the future.

“Which was sort of a joke, but as time has gone on, and picking up Jordan and a couple of other guys that were high-level tennis players, we’re starting to see where we are. We can compete with these guys that are at the top of this sport. That’s made it more exciting and… it’s definitely a big part of my life. We want to see how good we can get,” Booth said.

But of course, Goetzman and Booth see this as just the first major step for pickleball at the local level. The pair wants to recruit tennis players and players of other racquet sports from various age groups into the game. Odell Weeks, where Goetzman and Booth often go to play, hosts its fifth annual pickleball tournament in August

“We are starting to get a few more younger folks out and we’re starting to reach the tennis community a little bit and bring in some of the higher level tennis players local here,” Goetzman said. “But it’s just going to take time. You have the stigma with the name, and also the stigma that the sport is geared towards retirees. That’s kind of a myth, but you have to live through that.”

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