Pickleball Obsession
Pickleball advice and insight for recreational players who want to play better and understand the game. Hosted by obsessed amateur Tracie Hotchner, each episode delivers short, useful answers from certified pickleball pros that actually apply to your game.
Pickleball Obsession
Does Everybody Suddenly Want to Be a 4.0?
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#1032: Master pro Lisa Palcic talks about how 4.0 is an attainable skill level for some people and what it takes to get there — while Tracie discusses how there seems to be a trend for people in recreational play to call themselves 4.0 without going in tournaments using the Dupr rating or taking (the very difficult!) IPTPA skill test.
Welcome to Pickleball Obsession. This is the first podcast created just for recreational picklers with quick useful advice for amateur players from a variety of certified pickleball coaches. Whether you're a social player out there just to have fun or a competitive one trying to sharpen your skills and win more, the more you know, the better you'll play. I hope this show will get you up to the kitchen faster, dink with a purpose, and help you win paddle battles. I'm your host, Tracy Hotchner. You might know me as the pet wellness expert on NPR Sirius and my own pet podcast network, but here I'm no expert, just another admittedly obsessed player picking the brains of top coaches for advice we can all use. This show is brought to you in partnership with the IPTPA, the International Pickleball Teachers Professional Association, and the Association of Pickleball Players, the APP Tournaments. Sign up at pickleballobsession.net for the weekly episodes of the podcast, along with bonus content. Embrace the obsession. Well, Lisa Palsik, the author of the most fabulous complete guide to pickleball book, which anybody who doesn't have the book needs to get the book. It's just a gem of advice and wisdom. And I often will open it, Lisa, when I come back from playing and I think, what was wrong with that particular shot? Oh, I see she's got a picture for me. She's got a QR code, and it's fantastically helpful. But today, you are going to be of extreme importance because I think many of us, or those of you that aren't should be, are a little baffled how everybody who's a rec player now calls themselves a 4.0. This is just what they do. And how did this come to be? That's the question. Not are they lying? Are they cheating? What does it really mean? How did pickleball, rec pickleball, amateur pickleball, evolve to the point that people are using this number and then other people are calling themselves, oh, I'm only a 3.9. But where'd they get that number from? Are they saying I'm not quite as good as the six people I know calling them 4.0, themselves 4.0? So just to go back a minute so people understand why your opinion and your knowledge are deep and wide. You're the master pro for the IPTPA, which is the global entity that certifies coaches and also gives ratings, has nothing to do with Duper. It's its very own system, which actually involves hands-on testing. But you're also a certified rating pro, or say the word correctly, but it's it's a big deal. Other people aren't.
SPEAKER_01Sure. So I am the IPTPA ratings director and I am a certified ratings specialist. However, I also created the rating system with Seymour Rifkin, the president of the IPTPA. So um, and I've been I've been doing ratings for over 15 years.
SPEAKER_00So it's a big deal. I mean, uh it's I actually, out of curiosity, sort of participated unofficially in your 3.5 ratings clinic when you did your couple of days every few weeks in New Hampshire, because you're at the moment based still in Maine, and I came over from Vermont. And I was fascinated at how demanding that ratings is. How many reps of how many different shots you have to do correctly to even be called a 3.5. I know for a definite fact, having played now a true pickleball club in Latham, New York, three to four times a week for three or four years, that I would say close to 98% of the people calling themselves 4.0 or higher could not pass the IPTPA 4.0 test. Maybe many of them couldn't point the thr couldn't pass the 3.5 test. But before we talk about what that test would mean that someone would have to do, let's talk about how we got into what I consider a bit of a pickle, no pun intended, which is that duper, which was two were which originally was two different rating systems used by the tournament platforms that at the time were two and now are merged into one. You could enter a tournament and call yourself whatever you wanted because you were a virgin, you were naked, you came into the tournament world naked and you said, I'm a 3-0. Maybe you didn't know exactly what that meant. But you also didn't want to be considered too good and then be knocked down a peg. But you could go into a 3-0 and be very, very good. And then what? You'd get a higher rating, you couldn't play down to 3-0 anymore. And that happened at the 3-5 level and the 4-0 level. That's for people who went to tournaments. Most of the people doing rec play either have never been in a tournament, don't go regularly, or they're just small local tournaments. I think what really changed was when league play and even your own personal group of pals could call it a duper session. And then you would get, which I've seen now repeatedly, half a dozen or more people who only play with each other. This is mostly with guys, but it can happen mixed or females also. So they all go in calling themselves 4-0, which they did on day one. And if they only play each other and win and lose against each other, they're never not going to be 4-0. They're going to be some iteration of 4-0, because that's the logic to it. If there's nobody there who's like what you used to be when you were a pro player, a 5-0 who makes everybody look like oops, then they all make each other look good and they win and lose games and they remain at that 4-0 level. If they play in a tournament and they play in a 4-0 division, because now they have the duper rating, and they do horribly, it doesn't really immediately lower their duper score. But if somebody less good plays up and loses, it's all an algorithm that I think is nuts. Their duper score could go down, even lower than it is. So the question is, what does it matter that everyone's calling them many people are calling themselves 4-0 who have no basis for it? Do you think it matters to the sport?
SPEAKER_01I think it does matter. So ratings, you know, are a topic that are very important to me because I have been doing rating sessions since I begun teaching. Now, I'd like to go back, you know, 15, 17 years ago when Duper was not even a concept yet. Yes. And neither was the IPTPA rating system. Right. So back then, you know, when I was out in the West Coast and I was teaching, you know, full time out there, 40 hours a week, tons of players. We had um the Bend Pickleball Club. We had hundreds of players. And what was happening was we were having the these open play sessions and we were, you know, putting numbers on to them, you know, 3-0 session, five session, 4-0. And all these players out there that were either new to the sport or weren't tournament players had no idea where they fit in.
SPEAKER_02Yes.
SPEAKER_01So we then started a what what we called the Ben Pickleball Club rating system. So we were taking people through this, you know, rating system that we created ourselves, which I actually helped to create that system as well, where we would have a checklist of all the things that we would be looking for while you would be playing for certain levels, depending on what level you were testing for. We would watch you play, we would, you know, make notes as to did you do this, this, this, you know, and do we, in our opinion, actually feel like you are a three-five player? Now, the problem with that is exactly what I just said, in our opinion. Right. This very, you know, arbitrary piece of paper that I'm trying to watch for people and now, oh, you know, what and and it was a nightmare.
SPEAKER_00And by the, and by the, and by the way, Lisa, it could have been my bad day because I didn't sleep well, and I had two beers yesterday, and uh, you know, I I was rushing to get to the club, so it was like not my good pickle day, let's say.
SPEAKER_01Well, and then you have people that get nervous when someone's watching, especially if you're the pro watching them, they get very nervous. So anyway, so we were finding that you know, players that we felt like you know should have been possibly passing this evaluation, maybe we're not, and then other players were sneaking through because somebody, you know, had test anxiety or whatever. Yeah, and and and then you'd have, of course, people complaining. Anytime they just because it was not a set testing plan, they would they would say, you know, that's your opinion, or you know, and and argue it. So we found that the system was flawed. Now we used it for a while until Riff and I got together and said there needs to be something besides the USA pickleball rating. And now again, I'm gonna go back, you know, 15, 17 years. We played tournaments, you would get a USA pickleball rating because you played in the tournament and your results got reported, and you ended up with that rating. That rating also evolved over time, you know. It it started out where it was just a number, you know, it was URA 4-5 or URA 5-0. And then then it started to get down to the you know 0.056, whatever, right? So so then it that started evolving at the same time. But we realized that the majority of players out there are not tournament players. That's right. And the other thing is, which I think this statistic is going to be a little bit shocking to people, but and I looked up the current statistic as of today, so this is a very current um number. If you start at the beginner level, basically anywhere between 2.0 and 2.5, and you go up to 3.5, that is 80 to 85 percent of the players in the world. Wow, meaning more players 85 percent.
SPEAKER_02Wow.
SPEAKER_01Then you have 4.0 being five to 10 percent, and then you have 4.5 and above being less than 5%, really 5.0 and above being less than 1%. Right. So so basically what people, you know, recreational players, if the majority of recreational players, uh and 3-0 is the biggest category, by the way. 3.5 is 6. Interesting. You would think it would be 3.5, but it's actually 3-0 is the largest category, followed by 3.5. Now, when you have you know clubs that that maybe either use numbers, don't use numbers, and then they're calling something beginner, intermediate, advanced. Yes. Well, depending on where you are in the country, if you live somewhere remote or somewhere where pickleball just hasn't taken off yet, right? Now we're saying that our beginner players are, you know, day one, and now our intermediate players are day five. Yes, and our advanced players are I've played for a year, right? But you no, no, a month, a month, advanced player, right?
SPEAKER_00Oh, I've had people say, Oh no, I've been playing a whole month.
SPEAKER_01Right, exactly.
SPEAKER_00And they call themselves 4-0. I don't care where they came from, they can't have learned the ins and outs of pickleball at a 4-0 level in one month with no it with no instruction, mind you.
SPEAKER_01Right. Now, there are those those you know, small percentages of people like myself who when I started playing, I jumped right into that. But you were a you were a high, yeah, but you were a very high-level tennis player before. Exactly, exactly. However, I will tell you, I did not have all the little nuances of the game. That's right. I I'm I might have been playing at the 5-0 level, but when I played against you know some of the top players in the world at the time, they could certainly, you know, beat me with consistency, patience, skill, you know, particular, you know, their soft game, things like that. So, you know, even for me, it it it showed me, okay, yes, I am at that level, but I'm not fully at that level yet, right? And then what the more I started playing, the more I was, you know, fully into the 5-0 level and able to do all of those things, but still, it all relates on smaller scales, right? So now we have a bunch of players that play, you know, wherever they play in the country, and they don't want to be considered a beginner.
SPEAKER_00That's right.
SPEAKER_01And intermediate, they're you know, they're pretty cool with intermediate, but they'd love to be called advanced. Yeah, okay. Yeah, and again, depending on what club you're at, you know, just different clubs that I've gone to, the advanced group being the highest level being 4.0. Now, why does everyone want to be 4.0? Because it is an attainable goal for intermediate players, right? That's interesting. Yeah. Where where if you ask them, you know, they're not going to go out and call themselves a 5-0 because they're going to look at that and say, okay, that goal is not attainable.
SPEAKER_00That's right.
SPEAKER_01But for me to become advanced and play with what they consider to be the best players at their club, they look at that within reach. So that's what they strive for. However, what people don't realize is that the description, you know, of a solid, you know, rated 3.5 player, if you have, let's say, a tournament rating or, you know, a tried and true rating you've been playing for years and years, and you've got years of results of playing at that level, um, you know, those are truly rated players, right? That that really do deserve the rating they have. Now, it's it's gonna be surprising to you if I if I were to read to you the description, you know, of 4.0 players, just some of the things that a 4.0 player needs to be able to do and master, if you think of lots of three to 3.5 level players in your head, you know, you're gonna say, no, they don't do that. No, they don't do that. No, they don't do that. And then the other thing is you had the experience of taking just the 3.5 test. You didn't even see that. That's right. That's right. Now, now for the IPTPA ratings test, just to describe what this is. This is a test that Riff and I have gone through several different versions. I believe we're on our version, it's either version three or four right now. And we've changed it each time for the better to make it, you know, it is a test. And it's it is very, you know, um structured in that the first portion of it is going to be a fed portion of balls where you have to hit particular shots to different target areas on the court, and you have to remain in a certain percentage, right? So at 3.5, for the most part, we look at you need to be in that 70 to 75 percent range of if I feed you 10 balls, you have to be able to hit seven out of 10 of each shot. That's right. Now, yes, that's in the skilled fed portion, but we're also considering that to be in your play portion. You should also be able to hit 70% of the time that shot during play. So if we're saying that you have to be able to hit third shot drops from the baseline effectively, 70% of the time, people need to start reflecting on that and say, Am I yeah, do I actually do that? Am I actually 70 to 10 on this shot? You know, so and do I actually have a plan and attempt the correct shot? Or am I just sort of hitting the I don't know what I'm hitting, I'm just right, yes. So at the 4.0 level, to be a legit 4.0 player, now we're bumping you up into that 80% range. So now you have to be more like eight out of 10 percentage-wise on all of the basic shots. But not only do you need to be 80% on the basic shots, now you also need to be able to hit spin yourself. Yeah, you need to be able to play against spin. Yeah, so you need to be able to play against slice, you need to be able to play against top spin, and you need to know how to react to those things. We're also saying you also need to be hitting with some spin. Now, do you need to be proficient at both topspin and slice to be a 4-0? No, but you're gonna certainly be a better 4-0 if you can do, you know, either or both of those things. Now, it's not just that, it's also, and and these are my words right now instead of the IPTPA words, but also the way that I look at it as if you can ask yourself the question as a player, if you had a point that lasted 10 shots, how many of those 10 shots were actually planned and executed the way you wanted it? Right? And how many of those shots were just a sole reaction to what happened to you? Yeah. And I'm lucky to have just got it back, right?
SPEAKER_00Yep.
SPEAKER_01Yep. So when we're talking about are you a 4-0 player or aren't you? If yes, if the answer is yes, number one, you should be able to serve in a way that is uncomfortable for your opponent, not just the serve you like to serve, but the serve that they don't like.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So can you change your serve to be, you know, an offensive serve, not necessarily meaning it has to be fast, but you have to be able to do something to somebody that creates a return of serve that's weaker. Yes. Right now, the next question is do you have a plan for your return of serve? Do you know where and why you want to hit it there? Right? It can't just be, oh, I know I'm supposed to hit it deep. That's not 4-0. 4-0 is I'm going to hit it down the line to that person's backhand so I can set my person up that's in the middle of the court with their force. And then can you execute it 80% of the time off of the serve that's coming at you, right? So now we're a big ask.
SPEAKER_00And I think if if people stop to unpack that as they're thinking about it, I would say that most of us do not do that. We're kind of in this la-la zone of like, here comes the ball, I'm going to do something. Oh, I did it. Oh, good. As opposed to, I'm much more strategic than most people, but I'm a mental case. I mean, I actually think they should probably print a straitjacket with pickleballs on it. I think sometimes Greg, the manager at True, thinks, here she comes, let's get out the straitjacket. Because I'm so cerebral about it. So strategy questions. And and when the ball comes with uh uh somebody's unique kind of spin, I'm like, ah, what was I supposed to do? Get under it more, hit it softer, hit it harder, because I want to know. Doesn't mean I do know or that I can even execute it, but at least I'm asking.
SPEAKER_01But I call that pickleball IQ. So when I'm working with players, I say you have a very high level of pickleball IQ because you are actually thinking about these things. You are actually saying, hey, when I do this, I get this spin back, and I'm not really sure how to react to that. So how would I do that? Right. And it's it's thinking more than one shot ahead. Yeah. So that's a high pickleball IQ. So now having a higher pickleball IQ is also part of being a 4-0. Yeah, you can't be a 4-0 and just go out and just react. You may be a great athlete, but you have to have some strategy and thinking involved.
SPEAKER_00And maybe even talk to your partner like once every so often. So when I talk to some people, like a guy the other week, he's like not coming off the baseline at all after you return serve. And I'm like, hey, you've got to come up here. He said, he said, no, I he said literally these words. No, I will walk up there when I'm ready. I'm like, walk? And in fact, he would walk. So this is one of the issues is that people don't even realize how far off the skills chart they really are because nobody ever told them or they didn't care.
SPEAKER_01I'm gonna give you a few more descriptors for 4.0. Okay. Okay. So imagine that you're up at the net and you're you're in a a volley war right now. Okay, right? I give my 4.0 players two balls. And after two balls, if that ball is still up at your chest, I am telling them alarm balls should be going, alarm bells should be going for you. Yes, because after two, that's too many at the 4-0 level. Somebody needs to be able to lower or take the pace off the shot. Yes, if you are hitting five and six balls in a row that are chest height, you're not playing at that level. You're not playing at that higher level, right? So, so not only do you are you able to have fast hands and react, but now can you get the ball down? Yeah, okay. Yeah, so now let's talk about the other thing being at the net. What if you know somebody speeds it up at me? Am I able to handle that speed up and get it back without getting attacked? And then am I able to possibly hit a reset that's right myself back into the point, right?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01So even if you can get the ball back but you flail it up doesn't mean you're a 4-0. In order to be a 4-0, you need to be able to take that speed up and try to get it back and lower the ball on top of it. Now, are you going to be 100% on that? Absolutely not, but you still have to demonstrate the skill that you can do it. So, in the skill portion of the 4-0 test, there are two different volleys that you have to be able to demonstrate. One is being taking a ball that's that's you know, a drive right at you and dropping it dead into the kitchen, or taking that same ball that has, you know, been driven at you and hitting it deep and keeping it at your opponent's feet. So both those volleys get fed to you in the 4-0 test, and you have to be able to demonstrate that you can do both of those things, right? So that demonstrates that I can take control, take pace off, and it also demonstrates that I can stay offensive and keep my opponent deep in the court, right? So these are all little things. Now, I haven't even touched the iceberg of everything that is required of a 4 0 player, but those are just some of the things that you have to be thinking about. Now, court positioning is another one that is so important. Court positioning. Positioning, you need to be working with your partner, following the shot that you and your partner hit to a location on the court that follows the path of the ball that you just hit. Yeah. Not only do you follow the path of your ball, but you also have to determine was that ball good enough for us to move forward? Right. Right. Because if you popped it up, you should not just be running forward. That's right. You should be saying, oh crap, we popped it up. Now we're going to have to wait play defense, hit a better reset shot that's going to allow us to move forward. Now, what do most 3-0 and I would say, you know, most 3-5 players do when they're in trouble in transition? They try to hit hard, which is the exact wrong thing to do when you're in trouble in transition zone. So from transition zone, you have to be able to hit a soft enough shot to get you out of transition zone without getting attacked. Yeah. Right. So that's another characteristic that if you want to be a 4-0 player, that's another thing that you have to work on with your game, right? So we've already talked about, you know, being able to control your serve in a way that is gonna, you know, affect your opponent poorly. Do you return serve, you know, with purpose? And are you able to change pace, speed, height, spin? Number three, are you consistently hitting uh uh uh 80% on your third shot? Whether you drop, drive, lob, right? Are you are you somewhere between seven and eight out of ten consistency level of hitting a good shot? And then after that, once you get in the point, you're able to play against spin, you're able to be in the right place at the right time, communicate with your partner, get the ball down, you know, and and obviously there's still going to be some pop-ups, there's still gonna be some mistakes because every player, no matter what level, makes mistakes. But are we in that 75 to 80 percent range of consistency and thought and planning?
SPEAKER_00Yes. I mean, and I think this is really sobering because any of us who call ourselves 4-0 hear all that and say, honestly, truly, absolutely no, I can't do all of those three or four things, which, as you said, are only the tip of the iceberg. But if it's your goal to do it and you are paying attention to these ideas and trying to do it, at least you get some brownie points, if you will, for that. The problem is that when you're playing with other people calling themselves 4-0 who are running ahead of you up to the net as the return of your service coming back, you can't even, if you wanted to hit a cross court, they're in your way. I mean, literally, they're running that far ahead of you. You can't teach them what to do. But it definitely impedes your ability to play at a higher level because that touch, the touch and the planning are not there. And in rec play, you're usually playing with people you may know, but you don't play with them all the time or consistently.
SPEAKER_01Right. Now, as an advanced player, I will say because our topic is everybody wants to be a 4-0, and I understand that. I I fully understand it. I there I am not faulting that. I think everyone should have a goal. Yes, and I think that that is the most attainable goal for most recreational players, because we already said most recreational players are between 3-0 and 3-5. So, so yes, that is their that is their goal, and that's wonderful. But we we definitely you can't just go out and play and attain that goal. You must drill, you must take some lessons, right? You cannot just, you know, do it on your own unless you're coming into the sport as a high-level athlete, likely from another racket sport, is going to help you, but still, there are nuances to the game that still need to be mastered. Now, you know, as far as taking the IPTPA test, like I said, there's a skills portion, but after the skills portion is fed to you by the, you know, the certified rating specialist, there's also a play portion where we have you play skinny singles. We call it ghost doubles just because we want to demonstrate things that you would do during doubles, but you're gonna play against um an already middle of the road rated 4-0 player as one of your um opponents, and then you're gonna play the other two testers, and your scores need to remain in that sort of 75 to 80 percent range, you know, of your game scores added total. So can you hang at that level? Right. So now when when we talk about you know passing the 4-0 test, you could pass the 4-0 test by the skin of your teeth and be at the very beginning of the 4-0 level. And still, you know, you can hang there, but you know there's a lot to work on. And then there's some people that come in and already have a lot of the skills that we're looking for, and that's great. So they're gonna pass the test, but they're gonna be a higher, you know, 4-0 already. So okay.
SPEAKER_00So I'm just I'm just gonna use an analogy that is used in medical school that that I think wraps this up really well there about getting by by the skin of your teeth. What do they call the person who graduates at the bottom of their class in medical school? A doctor. Yeah. A doctor. So those of us trying to attain it and thinking, I'm doing it a lot of the time, but not all the time, I'd like to call myself doctor with a lowercase D. Lisa, this is fantastic. We don't want to overwhelm people with too much, but just to say that if you play in Florida or California or one of the really hot and heavy pickleball locations, the four-os there are way different than the ones in the Northeast or places where pickleball can't be played as much or hasn't been played for as long. So when I did tournaments out in Florida, I was like, okay, I'm playing 3-5 here, but it's a Florida 3-5, so I really got to bring my game. So it's it really does depend a little on the pool that you see them in. But it's great for people to hear this and to be sobered by it, but I hope also inspired by it, because clinics are the way to go. If you can get you know a pro to give a c a high-level clinic, advanced clinic for people, all of whom view themselves as almost a doctor, or they say, Oh no, I'm a doctor, but I'm not a neurosurgeon yet, then if you can play with three of those people or four of them with a pro, you're gonna your game is going to soar.
SPEAKER_01Thank you. Now, the other thing that I just want to mention before closing is that in my book, we break down every single level and each chapter is um designed for a person of that level to make it to the next level. So we talk about the skills that you should already have, the skills that you need to work on, and what do you need to do to get to the next level?
SPEAKER_00So that's a great point. So you can have it right in front of you, the complete guide to pickleball by Lisa Pelsick. It that is a great way. You know, you listen to this and you go, oh my God, how many, what, how many things do I have to do? And how often? Oh God, I think I'm gonna go take up golf. I always thought of golf as, you know, one chance to get it wrong. But uh that's why I never did it. But pickleball isn't like that, it's forgiving and it's and it's inclusive. So everybody should embrace this and not feel discouraged by it, but feel inspired by it. Lisa, thank you so much for being part of the show. It's really great. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for listening. I hope you've enjoyed it, and I'm proud of our partnership with the APP, the Association of Pickleball Players, which provides world-class pickleball competitions for professionals and recreational players. I'm also grateful for our partnership with the IPTPA, which is the world leader in developing standards and certifying coaches across the world. If you subscribe on Apple or Spotify, please also sign up at pickleballobsession.net to get the weekly email with the podcast and bonus content. Embrace the obsession.