Earlier this month the organisers of the Los Angeles Olympics hailed the decision to include skateboarding and surfing as core sports in summer 2028 declaring that these new disciplines, so popular among teenagers, would bring a “youthful energy” into the Games.

Now there is another hot new sport seeking a place beside them on the world stage, one that rose to prominence not on the back streets of Los Angeles but in the back garden of a congressman from Washington state, and then on the grounds of retirement homes all over the nation.

Pickleball, a tennis-like game that took America’s country clubs and gated communities by storm, is the fastest-growing sport in the United States, with 4.8 million players, celebrity endorsements, a professional tour and aspirations to join the Olympics.

The International Federation of Pickleball now has more than 60 member nations, according to Laura Gainor, of USA Pickleball. Most sprouted in the past three years, and only 75 would be needed to mount an Olympic campaign. “As all these countries strengthen their pickleball clubs, and as we work with our international partners, we are working in the right direction to be at the Olympics,” she said.

The sport was invented by three middle-aged men one afternoon in 1965. Joel Pritchard, a congressman for Washington state, had returned with two golf partners to his home on Bainbridge Island, where he found his teenage son, Frank, complaining that there was nothing to do. When Pritchard remarked that when he was a boy, he would make up games, his son asked bitterly “why he did not go and make one up” immediately.

Pritchard, then 40, and his friends went into the garden, where they had a badminton court. They dug out some bats and a perforated plastic ball from a child’s baseball set and began the world’s first pickleball match, playing over a low badminton net.

The game was named by Pritchard’s wife, Joan, not after their dog, Pickles, as has often been supposed, but after university “pickle boat” races, crewed by surplus rowers.

By 1990 it had spread to all 50 states, and by 2001 it was it was featured at the Arizona Senior Olympics. Played on courts a quarter of the size of a tennis court, devotees raved about how quickly beginners could grasp the game and begin having rallies.

Betsy Kenniston, 64, the author of an influential blog called Crazy Pickleball Lady, took up the sport on the recommendation of friends when she retired. She found it to be great fun. “A pickleball doesn’t bounce like a tennis ball. You are swinging at it and missing it and everyone’s just laughing,” she said.

The fact that the rules encourage players to keep at least seven feet back from the net made it seem the perfect game in a time of social distancing during the pandemic. Celebrities were picking it up too. In May 2020 the talk show host Ellen DeGeneres told viewers she was struggling to walk because she was playing so much pickleball. “I’m obsessed with it,” she said. The Friends actor Matthew Perry, a top tennis player in his youth in Canada, plays several times a week, he has told The New York Times.

Just as professional footballers play golf — a sport with a low risk of injury — in their spare time, so American athletes began taking up pickleball. When the National Basketball League, the NBA, restarted its 2020 season in a quarantine bubble in Florida, the referees organised a pickleball competition.

The Friends actor Matthew Perry, 52, says he plays several times a week

TAYLOR HILL/GETTY IMAGES

Gainor expects the latest statistics on the game, due out soon, to show that the average player is getting younger. Among them is Jack Loughridge, seven, from Las Vegas, who recently took gold in his age group at a national tournament in Arizona. He learnt the game last summer at a local country club. “The coach said: ‘He’s actually quite good at this,’ ” his mother, Courtney, recalled.

As there was no one his age to play against, Jack began taking on adults, who worried about competing against a child but stopped fretting as he began beating them, she said. At a doubles tournament over the weekend, Jack and his father, Brett, 39, were finally defeated by a team including Bryan Scott, a former American football linebacker. Jack now hopes to play at the Olympics. “I want to be the best player in the world,” he said yesterday.

The game is celebrated for the speed at which players can learn and start rallying

BEN HASTY/MEDIANEWS GROUP/READING EAGLE/GETTY IMAGES

Just as good a workout as tennis — and far more fun

I played tennis for many years and I can see now that I’ve done the right thing moving to pickleball (Roberto Rospo, a 40-year-old pickleball coach in Bristol, writes). Sure, tennis is a great sport and a good workout, but it just doesn’t give me the same fun as pickleball.

I started playing after my friend went to Palm Springs in the US on holiday and discovered pickleball and brought it back. At the time there wasn’t a club in Bristol, so we went to visit one in Wales and decided to start our own.

It has elements of tennis, table tennis and badminton. It’s played on a badminton court on a slightly lower tennis net.

I love the fact that it’s very fun. It’s a very sociable sport and there’s a really good sense of community. We get to play with players from different backgrounds, different ages. We play locally, nationally, internationally. You can play tournaments. The people are really friendly, really sociable, and I think that’s what makes the sport so special.

Despite initial impressions, it’s actually a great way to exercise. When you watch the video on YouTube, you think, “Hmm, isn’t this slow? I’m not sure it will improve my fitness or be a good workout.” But when you actually try it, you realise how good it is for fitness and for your mental wellbeing as well. I’ve been having lots of fun on the court.

As a coach I love it, because people can learn this sport very quickly. It is very easy to pick up and everyone can play it. It’s not as strenuous as tennis or other racket sports, so you can see the improvement in players really, really fast. It’s easy to learn, easy to pick and it’s great fun. And this is why it’s growing so much around the world.

REFERENCE: Pickleball: the star-backed sport with a shot at the Olympics | News | The Times