Winter brings out many sports from competitive slapping to ice fishing, but sadly, Tualatin High School (TuHS) doesn’t offer those sports. But what TuHS does supply its students is racquetball. 

Science teacher Tim Youngberg is the current coach for the Tualatin racquetball team. 

“It is a very fun and fast-paced sport,” Youngberg said. “I like how the ball is contained in a room, too, and you don’t have to go and chase it. 

TuHS racquetball holds practices at the Bay Club every Tuesday and Thursday from 7-9 p.m., training hard for the national high school tournament, which takes place in late winter and early spring next year in Portland or St. Louis. 

“Racquetball is also a lifelong sport,” Youngberg said, “so even after high school or college or whatever, you only need one other person to play.”

Racquetball is a customizable sport in terms of competitiveness and longevity, making it attractive to people like TuHS senior Tate Parker. 

“I really like how intense it is,” Parker said. “There’s never really a stopping point while you’re playing the game. You can hit the ball off of any surface of the room and always have to be focused, ready for the ball to come at you from any angle. It’s really intense, and there’s never really a time to stop and rest.” 

Parker makes the sport sound always intense, which it is, but the level of competition and pace are traditionally left up to the player. 

“I don’t play super competitively,” Parker said. “It’s my first year of racquetball, so I’m just doing it for fun. We just had our tournament and I just won my first two games, so that got me into the hardest bracket at that tournament, which felt really good because I play tennis really competitively, and that’s carried over into racquetball.”

Tennis and racquetball are overall fairly similar, sharing minor differences, the main ones being the absence of a net and being held in a fully-enclosed, indoor racquetball court. Many play racquetball as an alternative to tennis because tennis heavily relies on the outdoor weather. 

“During the game, it is really competitive when you’re locked in there,” Parker said. “But outside of the game, once you’re off, everyone is really friendly, and you’re able to talk to your opponents about the game.”