You've got 16 players signed up for your weekly pickleball ladder. Four courts booked. Format set. Then one player no-shows and another is running late. It's 15 minutes past start, players are complaining, and you're still scrambling for subs to get to exactly 4 or 5 per court.
We hear it from programming directors and organizers all the time. The fix is a format that doesn't care how many people walk in the door.
Gauntlet, our most flexible and most popular seeded format, is now available as a ladder format. It’s built to run with any number of players, no scrambling, no players waiting around.
This guide covers how it works, how it stacks up against Up & Down the River (UDTR), and how to pick the right one for your ladder each week.
Quick note on ladders
In this guide, we use the term “ladders” to refer to a weekly recurring ladder. Ladders rank players based on past performance and assigns them “steps”, allowing organizers to give everyone competitive games. Learn more about how ladders work on Pickleheads →
Gauntlet: built for any headcount
With Gauntlet, new matchups are generated each round. This gives it the flexibility to handle late arrivals and early exits, because you can mark players in or out on a round-by-round basis.
At the end of the session, the ladder’s step system moves players up or down step(s) based on their finishing position in the standings — capped at two steps either way.
Best for: Weeks when you can't predict who'll show, sessions with awkward player counts, or any organizer who never wants to manage the math.
Court math: Any number of players, any number of courts, any number of rounds. Two courts and 9 players? Works great. Three courts and 13? No problem.
💡 Pro tip: If you have exactly 4 players per court and everyone arrives on-time, run Up & Down the River. If you have a different ratio or someone is late, try Gauntlet instead.
Up & Down the River: the default ladder format
Up & Down the River (UDTR) is the standard 2 up 2 down pickleball ladder format.
Players stay on one court for a “round”, play one game with each person on that court, then top finishers move up a court and bottom finishers move down.
That court movement is what drives ladder steps. When a player moves up or down a court, they also move up or down a step in the ladder.
Best for: Stable, predictable headcounts where you can count on exactly 4 or 5 players per court.
Court math: Cleanest with all courts of 4. However, many organizers run courts of 4 and courts of 5. When this happens, we recommend playing to 15 on the courts of 4.
Round timing: A 4-player only round is about 45 minutes. If you have any courts of 5, rounds run closer to an hour and fifteen minutes.
💡 Good to know: Our UDTR format also has a 1 up 1 down option where one player moves up a court, one player moves down, and two players stay on the same court. This is a great option if you want to keep similar level players together (ex. DUPR events).
When to use which
Each format has its advantages depending on the player count, time constraints and other variables.
Consider UDTR when:
- You have exactly 4 players per court
- You have 4-5 players per court and no time constraints
- You are submitting the scores to DUPR
- All of your players show up on-time
Consider Gauntlet when:
- You have 6+ players per court
- You have 4-5 players per court and a strict 2-hour time limit
- Players are late
- You are still looking for subs
Both formats feed the same step system, so you can always run UDTR as your default and switch to Gauntlet for any session where the numbers get messy.
In fact, we designed Gauntlet’s step movement to mirror UDTR. The same percentage of players will move up or down steps based on a Gauntlet session, so you can confidently switch between the two formats in the same ladder.
💡Good to know: For now, selecting Gauntlet as a ladder format is currently web-only. You'll need to set it up beforehand on desktop. You can't switch to it in-app at the courts. (As of May 2026.)
A note on missed rounds
If a player misses more than two rounds in a Gauntlet session (late arrival, leaves early, takes a long break), they won't move up or down the ladder for that session. Their step holds. After the competition ends, a warning banner appears on the Standings tab if any players hit that threshold. This keeps the ladder fair without you having to manually adjust anything.
Where to start
Pick the format that fits the week in front of you. If you're not sure, pick Gauntlet. It works no matter who shows up, and you'll still get clean step movement at the end.
The whole point is that you stop worrying about the headcount and get back to the part you actually wanted to do: running great pickleball events.
You're good to go.
