Pickleball Magazine 1-6 | Page 61

COSTA RICA 7 Day Pickleball Tour with World Champ Jennifer Lucore and Bev and Bob Youngren participate. An America’s Cup event (U.S. vs. Canada) is being explored as well. The international potential of pickleball Looking at the players who stood on the podium at Nationals VIII highlights the international potential of the sport. For example, the Men’s Open Singles Gold Medal winner, Marcin Rozpedski, was born in Poland, and the Bronze Medal winner, Daniel Moore, lives in Japan. And all three medalists in the Women’s Open Singles Division were born outside of the U.S.: Irina Tereschenko from Russia (Gold), Lucia Kovalova from Slovakia (Silver), and Simone Jardim from Brazil (Bronze). Pickleball’s quest to become an Olympic sport When I worked as the Global Promotions Manager for Adidas in Germany, we received calls from “new sport inventors” around the world asking us to invest in the next global sport. Their ideas were creative, but I was skeptical a new sport with true worldwide potential would be invented in my lifetime. The game created by Bob Pritchard, Bill Bell, and Barney McCallum has all the right characteristics to become a global sport. The IFP’s role is to leverage this great sport and build on the momentum created in the U.S. to position pickleball for recognition and acceptance in the Olympic Games. We firmly believe that it’s not a question of “if” pickleball will be an Olympic sport, but “when.” • Mike Hess is Vice President of the IFP and President of the Spanish Pickleball Association. He’s also a professor of sport marketing and business strategy at CUNEF University in Madrid, Spain, where he resides most of the year. He spends the other part of the year in his hometown of Newport Beach, California. May 16-22 2017 Register Now! Space is Limited PickleballCostaRica.com When the game gets hot, keep a cool head Save 25% off your order at checkout with code: PICKLEBALL @www.headsweats.com DECEMBER 2016 | MAGAZINE 59