How to Play Pickleball with Your Romantic Partner Without Killing Each Other
Dinks On Tap: The Happy Hour Pickleball PodcastShow Notes
Let’s be real for a second: playing pickleball with your romantic partner isn’t always a love story. Sometimes, it’s a full-blown drama. You’re holding hands one minute, and the next, you’re side-eyeing their third shot drop like they betrayed you. We’ve been there. That’s why this episode of Dinks on Tap hit home in the best way.
In this episode, we chat with Teri Citterman and Dr. Stormy Hill, co-authors of In a Pickle: How to Master Love and Pickleball and Not Kill Each Other. We dive into the wild world of playing pickleball with your romantic partner, where tension, love, competitive behavior, and the occasional eye roll collide.
From emotional intelligence on the court to safe words, love languages, and intention-setting before a match, this conversation is full of real strategies for keeping both your game and your relationship strong.
We also touch on important topics like relationship advice for couples who play sports together, communication in sports, and how understanding partner dynamics can actually lead to deeper relationship growth, both on and off the court. Plus, we get into some unspoken rules of pickleball etiquette and the power of intentional play when the pressure is high.
Whether you're in love, in competition, or both, this episode is packed with relatable insights to help you play better together and maybe even argue a little less, on and off the court.
Cheers,
Casie & Lauren
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The must-read for couples who love (and survive) playing pickleball together:
In A Pickle: How to Master Love and Pickleball and Not Kill Each Other
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More from Dinks On Tap: The Happy Hour Pickleball Podcast
How did a game three grown men made up on a badminton court, because a 13-year-old was bored, turn into the thing your group text runs on? We found the kid who complained, and he still can’t believe it either. In this episode, we get into our summer vault, full of conversations, stories, and a little pickleball drama we never got around to airing. We sat down with Frank Pritchard, the bored kid himself, who can answer “When was pickleball invented?” because he was there when his dad, Bill Bell, and Barney McCallum made up the game on Bainbridge Island. We also cover Picklr’s Chapter 11 filing and the “is pickleball dying” headlines that followed, Genie Bouchard’s paddle-tap walkout and what it says about pickleball etiquette, and why the drinks after play keep the pickleball community together. You’ll learn: Why it's called pickleball, and the Pritchard family member who came up with the name A firsthand account of who invented pickleball, from the teenager whose complaining started it What the original pickleball paddle was made of, and which founder designed it The pickleball history most players don’t know, including how scoring and serving used to work Why Frank took a 30-year break from the game, and what brought him back What Picklr’s Chapter 11 filing means for your local club, according to the general manager of the Picklr in DFW How the pickleball business can struggle while the number of people playing keeps growing Why Genie Bouchard skipped the paddle tap, and whether we think she was justified How we won a tournament this summer by giving a screaming team a taste of its own medicine
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