Tennis Player of the Month – Joan Patchin

Dennis Whitley

If you have played tennis with Joan or have seen her play, you would think that she’s been playing the game for a while. You would be wrong. Outside of one or two singles games a year with her husband, Joan really didn’t start playing tennis till she arrived at PebbleCreek in 2016, and playing doubles was completely new to her.

Another observation from Joan’s play on the tennis court is that she has “wheels”. She gets to almost anything hit to her side of the court and sometimes her partner’s side as well. Having natural athletic ability explains some of her speed, but being on the Canadian Woman’s World Masters soccer team might account for some of that quickness.

While signing one of her sons up for soccer one year, she was asked if she would consider playing soccer on a local women’s team. She decided to give it a try and eventually worked her way up to the Premier Level of play within her league. This high level of play led to Joan being on the Canadian World Masters Women’s 55+ Soccer Team, which traveled to Aukland, New Zealand in 2017, where they competed with other countries and came home with a bronze medal. Joan has also won medals at the provincial level at home in Canada.

Having grown up and worked on her family’s farm in Saskatchewan, eating right and being physically fit were just part of everyday life on their farm. Joan continues this lifestyle in her adult life both here in PebbleCreek and in Calgary. Joan plays tennis with three teams here – In-Sync, Passion, and Women’s 3.0 USTA Team. In addition to all of this tennis, Joan plays golf a couple of times a week, plays pickleball, and rides her bike to most of these activities.

Joan has been married to Curtis for 39 years and they have two sons, Brad and Brent, and one granddaughter, Kira. In 2008, Curtis and Joan came to the valley looking for a condo or villa where they could spend their winters. Having spent ten days and three tanks of gas looking at properties all across the valley, they made a wrong turn and stumbled upon PebbleCreek. They had a list of things they were looking for and PebbleCreek checked all the boxes! They built their home in 2010.

Joan retired in 2016 from the dental industry where she worked in both private practice and at the university level where she developed teaching programs.

The PebbleCreek Tennis Club is proud to acknowledge Joan Patchin as a prime example of living the active adult lifestyle.