Padel A Sport for the 21st Century The Padel Federation (United Kingdom)

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Padel – A Brief Introduction to the Sport A padel court is 20m x 10m, with 3m high walls of concrete blocks or glass at the 10m ends and part way from each back corner at 3m high for 2m, then reducing to 2m high for a further 2m, towards the central net. The rest of the 'enclosure' is strong metal fencing of 50mm x 50mm x 3 or 4mm diameter wire and this goes to a total height all round of 4m. Including its foundation, an outdoor padel court in the UK is expected to cost around £30,000.00. Padel is usually played with doubles pairings, it is a combination of tennis and squash and it is an excellent sport that is increasing in popularity. It is easier to learn than tennis, squash or badminton but it can also be played to a highly skilled, athletic level. Around one million people, from youngsters of 4 through to adults into their 80's play padel in Spain. It is currently played by over 7-million players in around 20 countries including; Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Paraguay, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Uruguay and the USA. In Spain, padel is played in private gardens and at Tennis/Padel Centres. There is a 'Pay & Play Centre' in Madrid, which has developed from a 'field' into a profitable complex of 20 tennis courts and 36 padel courts. Spain has been the most successful tennis nation for many years, with reference to the numbers they have in the top 100 World Tennis Rankings. In the last 20-years, the number of people regularly playing tennis in Spain has remained constant at around 200,000 but during the same period, the number of people regularly playing padel has increased from 20,000 to around one million. This should not infer a conflict between these two sports, which can and should be complimentary to each other. Some coaches teach both sports. These statistics show how popular padel can be if it is positively introduced. The scoring and most of the rules are the same as tennis, the main difference being that serves are underhand, which can be a positive because it virtually eliminates serves that are not possible to return. The playing surface for indoor and outdoor padel courts can be tarmac, which can be coloured green, blue or terracotta with acrylic paint or artificial grass, with partial sand infill for indoor courts and full sand infill for outdoor courts. Play can continue on courts with concrete walls in light rain but this is not advisable for courts with glass walls. A padel court is 200m2, which is almost the same size as a singles tennis court, within its lines (195m2). It is slightly wider and slightly shorter than a singles tennis court. As the area required for a padel court is only a little over one third that required for a tennis court, with its ‘run offs’, padel is commercially attractive and excellent for schools because on three concrete wall courts, in an area only a little larger than that required for one tennis court, where only a maximum of 4 can play at a time; up to 30 youngsters can be active. 12 players can be involved in three doubles matches with the others using the outside walls as 'Hitting Walls' in allocated hitting areas, until it is their turn to go onto a court. Padel courts are used for short tennis in Spain, which can release tennis courts for alternative bookings. Apart from providing youngsters with the basics of tennis, padel courts can also provide youngsters with useful net practice and other tennis routines. Tennis 'baseliners', who are nervous at the net, can gain confidence at coming up to the net on a padel court because of the shorter distance from the base line to the net.