A big thank you to all who bought club shirts in July. We are looking forward to seeing you all sporting this new club gear on the courts!

Next up, this fall, will be an opportunity to order club hats and jackets. Watch for more details to follow.

As of the fall of 2025, SAPC has had to divide its Adult and Youth memberships into two more levels: 

• Resident, for those residing within the boundaries of St. Albert, and
• Non-Resident, for those residing outside.

If this change had not been made, all SAPC members would have lost access to city school gyms during the indoor play season. With this change, SAPC has been able to preserve this school gym access for the those members residing in St. Albert.

Be prepared to show a membership card with a "Resident" membership level to play in our schools this year.

Those with a non-Resident membership level will continue to use our many other facilities for club-organized play, including the Red Willow Community School gym, Alpine Courts, and private venues such as Raise Athletics and One Possession Academy booked by SAPC.

SAPC's costs to use school gyms continue to be fully covered by the one sticker charge for players.  SAPC's costs to use schools is therefore not covered by membership fees.  This is one reason why the membership fees are the same for both Residents and Non-Residents.  It is also easier on our members and volunteers not to have to administer or pay different prices. 

If you move into or out of St. Albert, please email our Membership Director to have your membership level (resident status) changed at no additional cost.

Do you want to improve your pickleball game with deep serve returns, third shot drops or resets? Well now's your chance with our newly purchased ball machine.  We have started offering three (1 hour) drill sessions every Monday evening on Court #4, Alpine Courts.  These sessions will continue for the remainder of the outdoor season. 

Every week, members can reserve the machine using an event in our reserved play calendar. Registration for a particular Monday will open at midnight Thursday (12:01 am Friday) three days before that Monday. 

Each session is open to one member and their member-partner at a charge of two stickers each.

Mentoring is also available at no extra charge.  

See the reserved play calendar for available rental periods. Open a ball machine event in that calendar to learn more.

We know. So just go play. There are 250+ members in our club who have no rating, and we have play-times just for you.

Pick any "All Play" or "2.5/Unrated Play" in our Alpine calendar (or in any of our school calendars during the indoor season). Then just drop in to any of those sessions and join in the paddle play -- no need to register in advance. 

You ask, "how do I know if it is 'drop-in' play?"  Well, all our play is drop-in play unless it says something special like 'Partner Play', 'DUPR',  or other registered play.

And all our Alpine Courts drop-in play is at no extra charge. Just be prepared to show an up-to-date membership card. This card can be found in your membership profile, and may be printed or saved to your smart phone.

As of July 4, 2024, SAPC requires players to have a DUPR Reliability of at least 60, if the member wishes to use their DUPR rating as the basis for:

• a new club rating at the 3.0 level or higher, or
• a change in their club rating.

What is this DUPR Reliability?  See the new Reliability article near the bottom of this page.

It is easy to get a Reliability of 60 if you play in 20 DUPR games that are entered into DUPR by a club, such as SAPC, EVP, The Pickleball Hub, and other facilities and clubs in the area, and if all 20 of those games are within the last 3 or 4 months.

DUPR updates everyone's Reliability on Tuesday each week, so it may take a few days before you see a bump in your Reliability that results from games entered into DUPR.

It will be challenging to attain a DUPR rating Reliability of 60 if you only have player-entered games in DUPR.  

For more info:

• see your July 4 email from the club on this subject
• check out these club pages:
• SAPC Skill Levels and Ratings
• DUPR
• SAPC DUPR FAQ

2026 memberships can be purchased starting Oct 1 2025, are effective immediately after payment, and expire Dec 31 2026.

Renew your Pickleball Canada and Pickleball Alberta membership BEFORE renewing your SAPC membership. The PCO and PA memberships are purchased on a separate system. See this webpage under the Explore Joining menu for more details.

After renewing with PCO and PA, log back into this site and go to our Join page to join or renew. If you have kept your membership up to date, you can also renew by opening your profile and pressing the "Renew to 2027-01-01" button within your profile.

As of May 2025, you can remove yourself from a waitlist for reserved play.  Please do that whenever you become unavailable to play at the reserved play event. 

If you remain on a waitlist, watch your email closely as you could get an email, right up to the event time, saying you are registered to play. This is because our system automatically registers people at the top of the waitlist whenever registered players cancel.

The easy steps for removing yourself from a waitlist are on this Reserved Play page.

The outdoor pickleball players of St. Albert have already outgrown the space at our Alpine and Larose courts. More outdoor courts are needed now.

Your club has worked to inform our City and, in particular, our City Council,  of this need for more courts.

Our latest presentation to City Council, which was on October 15, 2024, may be seen at the link below. In this video, go to:

• minute 4:28 to 9:40 to hear our President Eileen's 5-minute presentation,
• minute 9:40 ++ to hear Council's questions to Eileen and our club's responses, and
• minute 32:00 to 44:00 to hear Council's pickleball-related questions to city administration.

Thanks to the SAPC Facilities Team for all they are doing to help build our pickleball future in St. Albert.

Video

Our city's courts are full, and demand for more play continues to grow at more than 20% per year.

Club members showed their support for new courts by attending our President's presentation to City Council on October 15.

Here is the Gazette article.

The best play is usually play with others matched to your skill level so, like most other clubs, much of our play is organized by skill level.  Those without a club rating can play in our 2.5 level games or in our "All" (All Play) sessions.

See our Skill Levels and Ratings webpages for info on getting a rating or advancing your rating.

What skills should you learn and practice to reach the next level? Check out this chart from Pickleball Canada.

Your SAPC club rating and your DUPR rating are different from each other, but one of the ways to get or advance your club rating is by participating in the club's DUPR play.

This 2025 outdoor season the club is offering:

• "Aspiring to" DUPR play for those wanting to establish a club rating , and
• Regular DUPR play for those who already have a club rating and would like to advance that club rating. 

Your DUPR rating will move up and down based on your DUPR play, but this will NOT affect your club rating until and unless you ask for your club rating to be adjusted. 

If and when you ask, your club rating will be reset up or down to match your DUPR rating. There is one exception to this. If:

• you participate in the club's "Aspiring to" sessions, 
• you currently have NO club rating, AND
• you've just completed your 20th DUPR game, 

For more info, see these pages:

• Skill Levels and Ratings
• DUPR
• SAPC DUPR FAQ

SAPC welcomes youth members 12 years of age or older. See our youth membership web page for more details.

See our newsletters.