DAWSON
Takes Gold
in USTA Tennis Nationals and USAPA Pickleball Nationals
Dawson becomes
first person to win
championships in both
sports in same year.
48
T
here’s no question that pickleball is
growing nationally, but the fact that
two top-tier USTA tennis professionals
took gold in the Women’s 35 Doubles at
the Pickleball Nationals this year is proof
that pickleball is crossing inter-sport
boundaries.
Jennifer Dawson, tennis pro at the Bobby
Riggs Tennis Club in Encinitas, California,
won the USTA 45 Tennis Singles Nationals
in October before coming to the USAPA
Pickleball Nationals with her partner,
Cammy MacGregor, to win gold in the
USAPA Women’s 35 Doubles. MacGregor,
who is another figure of renown in the
tennis world, is the tennis pro at The Club
at LaCosta in Carlsbad, California. The backto-back dual championships made Dawson
the first person to win Nationals in both
sports in the same year.
But being a champ at tennis doesn’t
guarantee gold in pickleball, and the pair
worked hard for their pickleball titles, given
the challenges that they faced this year, on
and off the court.
MacGregor separated a clavicle in
February, eliminating her from all sports
for about three months while she healed
from that injury, which she sustained while
playing soccer.
With her return to the court in June,
MacGregor said that she wasn’t 100 percent
for tennis, but ready to take up pickleball
again with Dawson.
“I wasn’t really ready to serve in tennis. I
just wasn’t to the level where I was before
the injury,” she said. “But for pickleball,
Jen and I have played so much together—
we’re so competitive—that we were totally
excited and have been playing well together
this year.”
The pair picked up pickleball about a year
and a half ago and, while they’ve excelled
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at the sport, evidenced by their November
gold medal, they both say that they have
room to improve.
“Basically, we just want to keep having
fun playing, trying to improve and get
better. There are areas where we can
definitely get better and keep developing,”
Dawson said. “We were drawn to it because
it’s different and new, and for me, the
hardest thing was having the patience and
the touch you need for pickleball. People
think it looks so easy, but it is incredibly
hard. The mental part is a lot tougher
than tennis. You need good concentration,
patience and strategy. It’s faster at the net.
There’s more momentum that happens.”
According to her, she’s the power hitter
and MacGregor’s the finesse and a master
at volleys.
MacGregor said patience and strength
played a defining role in their pickleball
championship run because the duo was
not only playing against excellent and able
competitors, but brutal weather conditions
presented a nearly constant, driving wind.
“We played a lot of the teams before
and knew some of them quite well,” she
added. “We know their style and have lost
to some of them before, so all the matches
were really, really tough. We just played our
game and were steady. But at the Nationals,
it was so windy, you had to adjust to the
wind also and that was really challenging. It
was coming from a back-to-side direction,
almost like a northwest-type wind and it
was crazy how fast it was blowing.”
The win against Christine Barksdale and
Joy Leising gave Dawson (and MacGregor)
the USAPA Women’s 35’s National Title and
secured her spot in sporting history. •