The Snowy Mountains Pickleball Club (SMP) hosted a two-day pickleball tournament last weekend at the Cooma Regional Sports Centre.

Teams from Lakes Entrance, Bermagui, Narooma, Sapphire Coast, Jindabyne and Berridale travelled to Cooma to compete.

After competitive rounds on the Saturday, semi-finals and finals were held on the Sunday.

With the emphasis of the tournament being on enjoyment and social interaction, players converged on the Alpine Hotel on the Saturday night for an enjoyable night where new friendships were formed with their neighbours from the South Coast.

The standard of play saw some terrific matches, with games played in the true spirit of pickleball.

The Division 1 championship semi-finals enthralled the spectators with four local teams fighting out exciting three set matches.

David Bracher and Peter Ewart fought a close see-sawing match against Jose Gonzalez and Remo Zanivan that saw many exciting rallies and very high standard of play, with Jose and Remo being the eventual winners.

In the other semi final, Ryan Sagodi-Hogan and Trin Hewitson were unfortunate to go down to the eventual tournament winners Lucio Feroldi and Adriana Caceres.

Lucio and Adriana have been the outstanding team in recent competitions but had to pull out all shots to eventually defeat Ryan and Trin.

Lucio and Adriana went on to defeat Jose and Remo in a hard hitting final but the standard of the matches and improvement in all teams show that more and more teams are emerging to become strong challengers.

SMP also dominated the Division 2 championships. Marco Succi and Kirsty Herbert were very unlucky to go down to Lynn and Tony from Lakes Entrance in the championship final, with SMP teams featuring in all the finals.

Emily Deck brought in the family after her mother, Jenny, had to unfortunately pull out with a broken arm.

Pat and Dom Dorahy came to the rescue at the last minute and featured in finals in both divisions.

The domination by teams from SMP at the tournament reflects the success of the newly formed SMP Club with more and more locals playing all the time.

Despite the success of the teams, the real victory for the weekend was the competitive nature of all games but in a spirit that exemplifies the true spirit of how sport should be played in local communities.

Division 1 results

Tournament champions, runners-up

Lucio Feroldi and Adriana Caceres - SMP; Jose Gonzalez and Remo Zanivan - SMP

B grade champions

Linda Knight and Francisco Alvarado – SMP; Barbara Halam and Alison Chymiak - SMP

C grade champions

Michael and Rebecca Tranby - SMP; Kirk and Graham – Narooma

D grade champions

Darren Boots and Dean Peri – SMP; Flora Elliott and Machelle Grant – Jindabyne

Division 2 results

Tournament champions, runners-up

Lynn and Tony - Lakes Entrance; Marco Succi and Kirsty Herbert - SMP

B grade champions

Emily and Dom Dorahy – SMP; Craig and Sandy Schofield - SMP

C grade champions

Mary and Nicci - Bermagui; Eric and Wendy Ventura – SMP

D grade champions

Ryan Osborne and Pat Dorahy - SMP; David and Shelley – Sapphire Coast

SMP continues to grow with new players joining all the time.

The club has amazing members who all put in and helped make the tournament a huge success.

Special mention to Mick and Tammy Askell and Michael Tranby who always put in so much time and energy to making the club run so well.

Also Emily and Matt Deck and Carolyn Hayden for what they do for the club.

SMP would not be able to host these tournament without the support of local businesses and has thanked Bendigo Bank, Snowy Sheds, Rhythm Snowsports and Mitre 10 Cooma.