Padel - a very Spanish sport

“Okay. You’ve played tennis, right?” “Yes, and squash for several years.” “Good, vamos,” says Riccardo Grandi. He organised the court for a special premiere: a German SUR reporter being introduced to the popular Spanish ball game and one of the fastest growing sports in the world: padel. A sport that has not yet caught on in other European countries, but is lots of fun to play.

The padel racket looks like it will take some getting used to. The balls seem just like tennis balls. Riccardo serves, the ball comes, I miss it. It can happen. Second ball, I miss again by another 10 centimetres. Unbelievable. But I’m determined. “Yes!” the coach exclaims, as, after a quarter of an hour, I finally hit the ball. Every beginner needs a padel initiation course. The main thing is getting used to rackets with a short handle; after that everything changes. After the initial misses, now I already feel like a padel player. Hitting the ball is a satisfying feeling. The movements are like in tennis, the backhand comes naturally but I’m having some problems with the forehand. However the padel balls are fun as they are slightly more bouncy than tennis balls, and I am familiar with the wall passes from squash. One difference to tennis is that the serve is not particularly important. What is important is that I hit the balls. After half an hour Claudia and Julián join us. Padel is played in doubles, bringing extra energy to the game and making it unbelievably fun.

But what kind of sport it this, which only seems to be this popular in Spain and other Spanish-speaking countries? “400 to 500 people a week play on my six courts,” says Diego Lozano, previously one of the top-20 Spanish tennis players, who runs El Mirador, a sports complex in Marbella. It costs 20 euros for an hour, which is not expensive split between four players. “The good thing about padel is that it’s a mix of squash and tennis,” Lozano says. What’s more, it is easy for beginners to pick up quickly.

To sum up: padel is a cross between tennis and squash. An ideal sport for all age groups and abilities, where points are won through strategy rather than mere strength and power. Padel is played in doubles in a court that is partially enclosed by glass or hard plastic. The court is a third of the size of a tennis court. As in squash, the back and court walls are included in the game. It is played with short rackets with no strings. They are made using carbon-fibre-reinforced plastic and can be bought starting at 70 euros, however at most facilities you can hire them.

The roots of padel lie in the Mexican seaside resort of Acapulco. Enrique Corcuera is considered to be the inventor of the game. He was a businessman who did not have enough space to build tennis courts, so instead built smaller courts which were surrounded by walls. Due to the size of the space he decided to play with wooden rackets that were smaller than tennis rackets.

In the early ‘70s, padel was traditionally only played by the Mexican elite. During a visit, Corcuera’s friend Alfonso Hohenlohe, a Spanish member of the jet set and founder of the Marbella Club in 1954, became enthusiastic about the new game. With some small changes to the rules (scoring is done using tennis rules) and the courts, Hohenlohe built the first two European padel courts in Marbella. The former Spanish King Juan Carlos and Spanish Wimbledon champion Manolo Santana began promoting the sport in Spain, and it gained further recognition across the Atlantic after Julio Menditengui, a friend of Hohenlohe, took padel to Argentina.

Today, Padel is recognised as one of the fastest-growing sports in Europe, South America and North America. Since 2005 there has been an annual tournament based on the ATP Tennis World Tour. In the first week of June, the World Padel Tour came to the Marbella Arena. This year almost all of the 4,000 seats in the stadium were full for the final rounds. The tournament was dominated by Spanish players, which is unsurprising given that Spain is the country where padel is most popular, with more than 20,000 courts and four million active players.

Nevertheless padel is also becoming more popular in northern European countries and the UK. The Lawn Tennis Association described it as “a fast-paced, social sport that’s easy to pick up, but difficult to put down,” adding, “It can be played by anyone and everyone, no matter your age or ability.” There are currently around 250 padel courts in Britain.

What makes the sport so popular? According to Riccardo Grandi the reason is simple. “The game is so fun and it is relatively easy to learn,” says the qualified tennis coach, who has taught in the Hofsäss-Academy for thirty years, adding, “Unlike with tennis, you don’t need months or years to be able to play.” The difference lies in the simplicity of the game, which does not require a complex technique for the different strokes.

Grandi reminds me repeatedly during my first game to reduce my backhand stroke by half, and to use the slice movement more often. This is a standard stroke in padel, where the ball is hit with an undercut.

Because the game is played almost exclusively in doubles, team spirit is important. “The fast direction and speed change require good communication between partners.” Another positive: “Padel is a versatile sport, which requires a high level of concentration and works every part of the body.”

And he’s right. I can feel the muscle ache the next day, but I also feel a desire to return to the padel court soon.