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PANAMA CITY, Fla. (WJHG/WECP) - Over at Brunswick Hall in the Tapestry Park community, the 4 co-founders of Sunsets and Dinks get their practice in daily.

The owners being Gavin Choosakul, Freddy Vaughn, Scotty Nelson and John Minshew. They’ve been avid pickleball players for the past few years now, watching the game grow and grow.

“So pickleball is the fastest growing sport, 3 years running. the best way to put it, is if tennis and table tennis had a baby, pickleball would be it”, said Choosakul.

And Gavin’s not just saying that because he’s lives, laughs, loves pickleball. That “fastest growing sports, 3 years running” fact is fact. You can in fact stretch it out to the past 6 years as since 2018, the participation in pickleball from American’s 6 and older has increased 171.1%... and the fact that anyone from ages 6 to 100 can play, is the main reason why.

“Because it caters to a plethora of individuals. Athletic folks, all ages, all sizes, people that want to have just a simple pick up game can do it. Folks that want to have a more strategic and complex game, it can also cater to those people”, said Choosakul.

“It’s all levels. All levels, from 2.5 all the way up to 4.5, 5.0 even. That’s the beauty of it. Anyone can do it. That’s literally what pickleball is all about right there”, said Minshew.

“We loved it so much, we actually started a pickleball apparel company”, said Choosakul.

The levels John was speaking are levels on a scale from 1.0 to 6.5.

The game of pickleball is not just a hobby for these guys. It brought them together, it made them friends and it help them build a brand.

“So we, obviously met on the pickleball courts at Lyndel and a friendship grew out of it. We brought it up one day about starting a clothing line, apparel company. Gavin and I had the first initial conversation about it and of course all 4 of us are good friends, so we took it from there and ran”, said Vaughn.

The company is called Sunsets and Dinks. And it has 2 purposes; to make the players look dope and provide the community with dough.

“One of the reasons we founded this company is because pickleball is kind of vanilla and we’re all very outside the box. So, we wanted to bring our personality and flavors, not only to our apparel company but in to hosting tournaments and giving something back to the pickleball community. We’re teaming up with Beach Care Services for this tournament to donate some of the proceeds to them. We’re also going to be donating some of the proceeds to Parker Sports and Rec Complex for letting us use their courts”, said Choosakul.

And now the guys are doing their part to promote the paddles.

“So, this weekend, Sunday, June 2nd, at Parker Sports Complex, we’re hosting our first annual Emerald Coast Turf Wars. A mini tournament inside of an overall, larger tournament, that we’re going to be hosting the first Sunday of every month, from now until the end of 2024. Anybody can sign up to play and if you keep coming month after month, we’re going to tally up all the points that you score, during each tournament. At the end, whoever is the highest scoring team, is going to get this championship belt”, said Choosakul.

This weekend’s tournament will feature 48 players collected on 6 different teams, play will begin at 9 am.