I played 7 games of pickleball in my backyard with the usual Thursday afternoon crew including Borden, Roger, Ron, and Tom.

I used a GoPro camera to record the action on video. In addition to publishing video of a few selected rallies which I’m sharing below, I used the video to obtain data on my third shot options (drive vs. drop) and chart the results. I’d never done this before. Instead of guessing or making assumptions about my third shot choices and results, now I have some numbers to work with. Those numbers aren’t as pretty as I’d like, but I can work on improving them.

During the course of 7 games yesterday I had 66 opportunities to hit the third shot of a rally. With those 66 opportunities I attempted 51 drops, 15 drives, and 0 lobs. That’s 77% dropping vs. 23% driving.

With the 15 drives I put 12 into play, 2 into the net, and 1 out of bounds.

With the 51 drop attempts I had 32 successes (defined as shots that my opponents had to play off of a bounce in or near the kitchen) along with 14 that were too high (defined as balls in play that my opponents were able to volley) and 5 failures (shots into the net or out of bounds).

Adding together the results of those 66 third shots: I had 44 successes, 14 shots that were less than ideal (the drop attempts that were too high and were volleyed), and 8 unconditional failures (balls into the net or out of bounds). That’s 67% success, 21% iffy, and 12% failure.

I plan to repeat this exercise in a few months to see if my numbers show any improvement.