Hybrid athlete, serial entrepreneur, and brand builder Eric Hinman was hooked on pickleball from the moment he first picked up a paddle.

The fitness influencer speaks highly of the health benefits America’s fastest-growing sport—and racquet sports as a whole—can bring to people’s lives.

We chatted with Hinman to dive deeper into his passion for pickleball.

Talk about your introduction to pickleball.

It was my buddy Matt Williams in Boca Raton who introduced me to it. He owns a snack bar company called FROPRO. We played when I was visiting my girlfriend's family over the holidays probably three or four years ago. Instantly, it was really enjoyable for me because it was a combination of tennis and ping pong. I played kind of back towards the baseline, like I would play tennis, to get more of a workout. I liked that it was easier to pick up than tennis. I had enough skill to be able to rally and get a good workout doing it. I love racquet sports. Tennis ultimately got me back into cardio shape, and I played ping pong as a kid growing up. Even in my late 20s and early 30s, we had a ping pong table in my office at my software company, Rounded, so it brought back a lot of memories. Once you have that swing, you don't really lose it. It's kind of like riding a bike, so I was able to pick it up pretty quick and really start enjoying it. There was a lot that I could improve on, too. That's the cool thing about pickleball, you can pick it up fairly easily, but you recognize that if you spend years playing it, you can really advance because there's tactics involved and a whole different level of skill that you don't have yet.

What do you enjoy most about the sport?

It's a great workout based on how I play. I generally play singles, and I play with people who enjoy rallying and playing back towards the baseline. If you're playing that way, it's more similar to tennis where you're going back and forth and you're swinging pretty hard to put some topspin on it, so I get a good workout every time I play. I've tracked it before, and if I play for 60 minutes, it's similar to a bike ride, where my average heart rate is in the 120s. Pickleball hasn't been a part of my training program recently, though, because I generally stick to my normal routine of gym, bike, gym, run, gym, bike, gym, run, because I'm a creature of habit, and when I'm into something, I really don't think of anything else. It might re-enter the mix. I just have to get consistent with it, and I do have friends here in Austin that play. The pickleball scene and facilities here are amazing.

"Movement is medicine" is your mantra, so pickleball is a perfect choice, right?

I often talk about fitness being in many different forms. The keys are doing something you enjoy and want to do daily, doing it with others, doing it outside, ideally, and doing something where there isn't a lot of friction. If you have pickleball courts near your house, your friends play, and you enjoy playing, it makes all the sense in the world to do that often as possible as your form of fitness. It checks all the boxes. It's incredible exercise, and it's one of those things where it doesn't feel like you're working out. You're playing a game, you're getting in great exercise, but you're not thinking about actually exercising. Oftentimes, a run can feel daunting or doing a hard CrossFit workout can feel daunting because you know that you're working out and there isn't a game aspect to it. I like that in pickleball, you're forced to move because you're playing a game.

How important is the community aspect of pickleball, too?

Having a crew to do it with yields accountability. It just creates a habit out of it. I think that's crucial. You get to meet new people when doing it. There's other people on the pickleball court. You can even ask someone to play as part of a meeting or social gathering. It's kind of like sauna, where you get the community aspect along with the wellness benefits of it.

What really sold you on pickleball?

Well, I have done it enough to have a level of skill that allows me to enjoy it, and I really enjoy skill-based activities where you can progress over time and get better. It's kind of like making a cappuccino, mountain biking, or Olympic lifting. There's a skill aspect to it, and I love things where the more you do it, the better you get. That's what I instantly enjoyed about pickleball. Even in that first game I played, I was tinkering with my swing, learning when to go to the net, and getting better at timing and reading my opponent. There's just so many components that you can improve upon.

Tell us about your background in racquet sports.

I had a ping pong table from a very young age. I'm an only child, so my way of building community was either playing basketball in the backyard or playing ping pong in the basement. My dad played ping pong with me. He really taught me the game. My uncles were very good ping pong players, too, so we'd always have big tournaments during the holidays when they were staying with us. And then when I had my software company, we had that ping pong table in our office. My business partners and many of our employees were very good ping pong players, so basically every day for three years, we would play several games throughout the day. I also have a ping pong table at our Colorado home. I need to get back into the routine of playing often. Now, my form of community is inviting people over to sauna. I guess I kind of forget that we have a ping pong table in the basement, but this is a reminder that I need to start doing that again with my friends.

One of my business partners in the software company also introduced me to tennis right when I was getting into wellness in my late 20s. I wasn't really doing cardio, but I was training with a personal trainer five days a week. He invited me to play tennis with him, and we started playing four or five days a week for 90 minutes, and that ultimately led to running again and then triathlon and then Ironman. Tennis is really what got me back into really good cardio shape, and racquet sports 100% led me to wellness.

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