Our ability to turn the most relaxed activity into the most ferocious of competitions never ceases to amaze me.
Take pickleball, for example.
I don’t play myself, but it’s my understanding that it’s a cross between tennis and badminton. That’s perhaps over-simplifying things, but you get the drift. It’s supposed to be relaxing.
When I first started hearing about it a few years ago, the activity seemed to be played mainly by folks of a certain vintage with more time on their hands than they might have once had.
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It’s possible elementary school students play pickleball in phys ed class, but for me, the sport will always be associated with silver hair and creaky knees.
Has that ever changed.
There are now professional pickleball leagues playing for big prize money, and the athletes featured on their websites look nothing like the people I know who play the game.
It probably won’t be long before pickleball is an official Olympic sport.
Truffle hunting is another example of how a leisurely pastime can be transformed into a competitive sporting activity.
Of course, searching for truffles isn’t all fun and games. The delectable fungus is highly sought after in some culinary circles, and hunting for them can be as much about profit as it is recreation.
There have even been reports of truffle hunters setting out poison for their rivals’ dogs so that they can have the best hunting grounds all to themselves.
Pigs were traditionally used to snuffle out the truffles, but the community has gravitated toward using dogs, which don’t tend to eat what they find. Pigs, on the other hand — well, they’re more likely to make pigs of themselves and chow down on the delicacies before they can be collected.
But no matter whether it’s big business or big fun, wandering through the woods hunting for truffles with your dog has always sounded like an idyllic way to pass the time.
Now that’s been turned into a competition, too.
The annual North American Truffle Dog Championship was held last month in Eugene, Oregon.
Dogs and their handlers competed in a horse arena, hunting for hidden truffle oil as they made their way past rows of bins containing soil.
It may still be fun, but it’s a long way from a laid-back stroll in the forest.
