Racquetball looking to grow exposure

By Lethbridge Herald on February 6, 2025.

Herald Photo by Justin Seward Dale Gerber attempts to hit the ball while Bob George looks on at the Lethbridge Polytechnicracquetball courts recently.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald

While there isn’t an official racquetball club in Lethbridge, they are affiliated with the Alberta Racquetball Association and a couple of local players that are doubles partners talked about the sport’s benefits and local challenges.

“Since 2021, we’ve come back to six competitive players that go to tournaments, and about 15 really regular recreation players that are pretty regular and then it just kind of builds up from them,” said Bob George.

While there has been curiosity from people for racquetball, there hasn’t been the larger numbers.

“The sport has not maintained pickleball’s present enthusiasm because it ran through that cycle ,” said George.

“But now like squash and to some extent badminton, it’s there and racquet sport players learn about it, and the ones that want to play a fast sport come and play racquetball.”

Facilities are a challenge in the city.

“Facilities is a big issue because if you don’t have enough (facilities), you can’t be visible,” said George.

Racquetball is considered a niche sport to George.

“We have less than 100 active players in a town of 110,000, so that’s not a lot of dominance,” said George.

George focuses on helping interested players between young and old.

“Often players who played a little bit for fun and the college kids that come down and wonder what the sport’s about, said George.

George, who is a Racquetball Canada ambassador for southern Alberta to help grow the game, teaches players through free lessons.

Dale Gerber said the great thing about racquetball is that there’s multiple levels for everybody.

“The reason that’s important is that anybody can say well I don’t know where to start,”

“Well, let’s start here. There’s a level for everybody.”

Local international competitors Coby Iwaasa and Naman Gauri have helped increase the awareness of the sport.

“So Naman and Coby are the equivalent to the Connor McDavid in racquetball,” said Gerber.

“That’s literally how good they are, top 10 in the world, and people may or may not know that. So we have a wonderful ability to be part of that and to maybe ride that wave and present a sport to people that maybe have never heard of it or seen it.”

George hopes that Iwaasa will get involved more as things develop.

“I expect him to almost build a teaching studio as things develop,” said George.

Drop-in sessions are available on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at Lethbridge Polytechnic’s courts to give people a chance to play the sport with other people.

Players are anywhere from eight years old to 80 that are participating.

George may have a possible racquetball facility announcement coming for Lethbridge in the spring.