Net Purchase

 I just bought a net from PickleballCentral.  They had a sale and I also used the TriValley Pickleball Club discount!  

The price was just a couple of dollars short of $200, delivered.

This is the middle net in re cost of the nets that were available.  The Swift net, which I've used and liked, as about $360 or so.  Here is the link for the one I ordered: https://pickleballcentral.com/rally-deluxe-portable-net-system/

As you will note, the is the "deluxe" version of the rally nets.  They have a couple of them.  

What is interesting about this net is that the tubes are oval, not round and are very heavy in weight and construction.  This is not a light net.  That makes it more of a burden to schlepp it, but ought to stand up to play and wind better.  

The issue I have with all the nets is the top wire and lack of wire on the nets.  This allows a lot of balls to hit the net and come over, thus rewarding bad shots.  Since hitting the ball hard will exacerbate this tendency, that promotes an "improper" style of play.  The solution to this is to elevate the net level above the official 34 inches to reject some of the balls that would have been stopped by a better top net edge.

I took a close look at the net as I wanted to put my own cord through it and add a means to tighten it to the side posts.  This net is fully sewn shut and there is no way to thread a cord unless I want to do some cutting.  I'll let that slide for the moment and see how it plays as is.

The tubes are about twice the weight of the round ones.  The center structure has a small piece to support the middle of the frame.  It looks like this will clip to the frame and doesn't have to be threaded onto a tube.  The center stick is not a rod, but more like a yard stick.  I've seen this on other nets, but have no experience with them.  I do like that it's sturdier.

The final issue is how tight the net can be stretched.  The vertical side posts are also oval and are aligned so that the long axis of the oval tube is on the place of the net.  Which should provide a solid foundation to tighten the net.  I'll add some markings or tape to allow easy location of the top level of the net connections at the preferred height.  

That's all I know for now.  It's yet to be setup or played on.  If there is any new information about that, I'll either edit this or create a new post.