Pickleball · 9 min read

My Husband Beats Me At Pickleball Every Sunday. His Secret Is A $49 Club.

My husband has won all 18 of our Sunday mornings since June, and I spent $599.99 trying to change that. His edge was never his paddle. It was ten minutes on our back porch with a short wooden Indian club that carries one small weight plate on its fat end.

By Megan Doyle

Staff writer · Oct 8, 2026 · 9 min read

Eighteen Sundays And I Have Not Won One

Pickleball was his idea. He played tennis all through high school, and the public courts at the bottom of Elm Street, the hill I climb in my weight vest, are a five minute walk from our door. Since the first Sunday in June we have played there every week at 8 in the morning, three games to 11, before the heat.

He keeps the score on the whiteboard on our fridge, which tells you something. It reads 18 to 0. I win the first game about half the time. I have never, not once, won a third.

That third game is the part I can't explain, because I am the one in this house who lifts. My Romanian deadlift sits at 45 pounds in each hand and I hip thrust 60. A pickleball paddle weighs about eight ounces. By game three I can't hold mine still.

Here is how it goes. Around seven all, my hand starts to squeeze. By nine all my knuckles are pale and I am holding the paddle like a hammer. A tight hand can't hit a soft shot, so my dinks start sitting up a foot over the net, and he puts every one of them away.

Five Things I Bought Before I Asked Him

Asking him felt like losing a nineteenth time, so I shopped instead. Here is the summer, priced on each maker's own site the week I wrote this.

The paddle. The LUXX is a control paddle, made for soft shots, and it is on sale from $280. My first game got noticeably softer that week. In game three the ball still went wherever my tight hand sent it. Best atTouch, while your hand is fresh.

The shoes. Real court shoes stopped me sliding on the baseline, which my running shoes never managed. Best atFootwork, outright.

The clinic. Four Monday nights with a coach. The best thing she told me was to hold the paddle at about a three out of ten. I can, for two games. Best atTechnique, outright.

The wrist weights. I wore them for slow shadow swings in the living room. My shoulders felt it. My hand did not, because the weight sat on my wrist, while a paddle pulls from out beyond your fingers. That turns out to matter. Best atShoulder work while you watch TV.

The gyro ball. You start it spinning and keep it going with small circles of your wrist. It was the most fun thing on the list and my forearm burned. It also sits in your palm like a tennis ball, which is nothing like holding a paddle. Best atFun, outright.

All five made my first game better. Not one of them reached the third.

What his hand does in game three

In late August I gave up on the ball and watched his hand instead. At nine all in game three he holds the paddle the way he held it at the start, loose, the coach's three out of ten for the whole morning. His backhand dinks still have that little roll on them that makes the ball dive at my feet. Between points he spins the paddle in his fingers like a pen.

Whatever it was, it started before we got to the courts. Every Sunday he spends about ten minutes on the back porch with a short wooden club, about as long as his arm from elbow to fingertips, carrying one small plate at the far end. He tips it, turns it and circles it around his head, one arm at a time. He bought it in May, the week we decided to try pickleball, and I had filed it under his tennis stuff.

The Number I Found About My Own Wrist

That Sunday night I sat on the sofa and went looking for why his arm lasts. I did not expect to find a number about mine.

The numbers come from emergency rooms. Researchers at the University of Cincinnati went through a decade of national injury records. In 2014 an estimated 1,313 people went to a US emergency room with a pickleball injury. By 2023 it was 24,461. Nearly three in four of them, 73.8 percent, were between 60 and 79, and about half the injuries started with a fall.

Then the line that stopped me. When the injured player was a woman, the odds that the injury involved her hand or wrist came out at 3.22 times a man's. It only counts people who ended up in an emergency room, so it describes what tends to go wrong for women who play, not what will go wrong for me. I still sat there turning my right wrist over in my other hand.

Surgeons at Rush University wrote a 2026 review of the sport's common injuries: broken wrists, torn rotator cuffs and sprained ankles. They count poor conditioning among the risk factors, which is their call to make, and they mean fitness in general. Here is the part I keep for balance. When a 2025 study asked 253 recreational players about arm injuries, the ones who did strength work reported no fewer than the ones who skipped it. So I can't tell you a club will change those numbers, and I am not trying to. My reason ended up simpler. Every Sunday a single wrist, forearm and shoulder do nearly all the work in this game, and mine were arriving at it cold.

The List I Wrote Before I Shopped Again

After three pairs of pink dumbbells I learned to write the list before I shop. This one had five lines.

1. One hand, held like a paddle. Nothing strapped on.
2. The weight out past my hand. A paddle's weight sits beyond your fingers, so your wrist is holding a lever, not a load.
3. Every way a wrist moves at the net. Tipping up and down, rocking side to side, and the roll that makes a dink dip.
4. The shoulder turning, not just lifting. Every overhead and every reach behind you.
5. Lighter than anything I own, then up in small steps. I wrote a whole piece on why the lightest setting decides your raises, and it decides this too.

Then I ran everything I owned against it. The wrist weights fail the first two tests. The gyro ball fails the second, and so do wrist curls with my dumbbell handles, because both put the weight in my palm. The fabric loop bands I already own for glute work pass the fourth test for nothing, and they do nothing at all for my wrist.

A traditional wooden Indian club clears the first four tests. Revolution Clubs sells a pair of 2 pound oak clubs for $69, on sale from $96, and if one light weight is all you will ever want, that is a lovely buy and you can stop reading here. The fifth test is the catch. They are 2 pounds forever, and every step up is another pair.

I did find one trial that tested weight on the end of a handle, though nobody in it played pickleball. Thirteen elite wrestlers in Turkey added a mace to their training, three 15 minute sessions a week for 12 weeks, while 14 teammates trained as usual. By the end, the mace group gripped roughly 5 percent harder with both hands, against under 1 percent for the others, and their shoulder rotation strength had gone up too. Wrestlers, with a mace set at 20 percent of each man's bodyweight, and no paddles anywhere. It is still the clearest sign I found that weight past the hand builds grip and shoulder strength.

The Stick By The Back Door

The stick is a Kensui EZ-CLUB V2 PRO. Picture a short wooden Indian club, about 50 centimeters long, whose fat end is a sleeve for standard 2 inch Olympic plates, with one black collar to hold them on. One club, the wood PRO, is $49. He runs his with a 5 pound plate. I run mine with one of the six 2.5s I bought for my vest.

It goes five for five on my list: one hand, the weight only out past it, every way the wrist moves, the shoulder turning, and a bare start that climbs in 2.5 pound steps on plates already sitting by my front door.

The Verdict

Kensui EZ-CLUB V2 PRO

One wood club, $49, in stock · rated 4.50 of 5 across 420 reviews that Kensui pools with its EZ-MACE

• One hand, and all of the weight past your fingers, which is exactly how a paddle loads your wrist.
• Tipping, turning and circling cover every way the wrist moves, plus the shoulder's rotation.
• Starts as a bare handle, then takes standard 2 inch plates in 2.5 pound steps.

His ten minutes, move by move

1. Hammers. Elbow at his side, club pointing up like a hammer, he tips the plate end forward toward the porch rail, then back past upright toward his shoulder. Ten each hand.
2. Wipers. Same grip, elbow still, he rolls the club out to his left, then back across to his right, like a windshield wiper. Ten each hand. That roll is the dip on his backhand dink.
3. Halos. Club up, he circles it slowly around his head, close to his ears. Five each way, each hand.
4. Ready holds. Club upright in front of his chest, the way he holds his paddle at the kitchen line. Twenty seconds each hand.

Two rounds, about ten minutes. Then it stands on its plate by the back door again and we walk down the hill.

Get the EZ-CLUB

$49, one wood PRO club · 100 day money back guarantee

My Turn With His Routine

I borrowed his on Labor Day. The first morning I did all four moves with nothing on it, which sounds like cheating until you try the wipers. A week later I bought my own, because at quarter to eight on a Sunday we both want it.

After the first week I added one 2.5 pound plate. I also hold it for split squats while he finishes his halos, which neither of us bought it for.

So, the scoreboard. Four Sundays on his routine, and the fridge still says 18 to 0. He still wins, because he has played racquet sports since he was a teenager and I have played for four months. What changed is where I lose. My game threes in June and July ended around 11 to 4. The last four ended 11 to 8, 11 to 9, 12 to 10 and 11 to 9. At nine all my knuckles are still the color of knuckles, and my dinks stay down.

The club is not why he wins. It is a big part of why his arm is still loose at nine all, and lately mine is too.

Owners who keep it light say the same kind of thing.

“Only loaded with 1.25kg disks so far, but works great and wooden handle feels great in the hand.”

Simon N., verified buyer

“I was wanting some clubs but didn’t want to pay hundreds to get different sizes. This works great with the plates I already have.”

Geoffrey D., verified buyer

“Nice quality and the collar works very well and it is easy to change weight. The grip diameter is perfect.”

Michael B., verified buyer

Now the three things I would change. The collar. Kensui's page itself says to add a second one past 60 pounds, and owners say the stock collar creeps near 30. Ours, at 2.5 and 5 pounds, has never moved. The plates. Only 2 inch Olympic plates fit, so my 1 inch 25s are no use to it. The weight. There is no published empty weight for the PRO or the MAX, so I can't tell you what the bare club weighs.

A big plate also comes close to your ears on the halos. And the 4.50 average pools club and EZ-MACE reviews, so it scores the family, not the club alone.

Every price above was checked on the seller's site on October 8, 2026.

What I Asked Before I Bought My Own

Wood or steel?

The MAX is the steel one, $99 and 55 centimeters long. At 5 pounds or less, the $49 wood PRO does everything we ask.

Do I need plates?

Yes, none come with it, and only 2 inch Olympic plates fit. If you own a plate loaded vest, look there first.

How light can I start?

Bare. My first week had no plate on it at all, and the wipers were still work. Add one when ten slow wipers feel smooth.

If it ends up under the sofa

The product page says 100 days, money back. The written returns policy wants the club unused and in its box, a stricter bar, so read it first. One club alone doesn't reach the $100 free shipping mark, so shipping is extra.