Padel
7 things you (probably) didn’t know about padel
Want to know more about the sport of padel? You're in the right place. Learn some of the curiosities around the game that make it different to racket sports like tennis, badminton and squash.
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Easy to play and perfect for socialising, padel is rapidly growing as a sport across the world. And the same can be said when it comes to spectating, with more viewers than ever expected to tune in for the Premier Padel season. And you can watch all the matches from the quarter-finals to the finals exclusively on Red Bull TV! Find out if you can access the livestreams here. If your country isn't listed, check your local listings.
Curious to find out more about the world's increasingly popular sport? Read on to discover some of the most interesting facts about padel.
01
It's a relatively new sport
Padel shares many similarities with other racket sports like tennis, badminton and squash. Unlike those sports, however, padel's history is quite recent. A Mexican – Enrique Corcuera – is seen as the founder of the game that's played today. He built a court to play a racket-based ball game at his home in Acapulco in the late 1960s. This court was a little bit smaller than a tennis court due to property constraints and he surrounded it with walls which were then incorporated into the game's play.
02
Padel is more popular than tennis in Spain
Padel is one of the fastest-growing sports in the world in terms of active participation. According to the governing body, the International Padel Federation (FIP), padel is now played by around 25 million people around the world, with the game enormously popular at a grassroots and professional level in countries such as Mexico, Argentina and Spain. FIP estimates that there are courts in more than 90 countries.
The game is more popular than tennis in Spain, with more than 20,000 courts in operation, while in countries like Sweden, Italy and the UK there has been a huge increase of people playing due to an expansion in courts being built.
In Spain, padel is a massive sport at grassroots level
© Jaime De Diego/Red Bull Content Pool
03
Padel is mainly a doubles-only sport
It's very rare to see padel played as a one-on-one game. At a professional level, the sport revolves around doubles play and has done so since the first organised tournaments took place in the 1970s and '80s.
There are some specific reasons why the game has evolved as a doubles-only game. The speed of the game combined with the smaller size of a padel court makes it difficult for one-on-one play. That's not to say that you can't play one-on-one, but you'll have to play on a court designed for one-on-one games. Whereas on a tennis court you can adapt it for doubles and singles play, this isn't possible in padel. Most courts built around the world are doubles-specific.
04
Padel rackets don't have strings
The modern padel racket has no strings, which makes it distinct from other popular racket-based sports. A padel racket has a short handle and a foam core covered with an outer shell that could be anything from fibreglass to carbon fibre or graphene.
How a no-strings racket came to be the equipment that was adopted for the sport is again due to Enrique Corcuera. Corcuera and his wife used small wooden paddle bats rather than tennis rackets to play the game at their home. The small size of their court and the power of a tennis racket meant that balls flew everywhere, so a less powerful racket had to be sought to slow the ball down and keep play going. Over time, padel rackets evolved from that wooden bat to what we have now, but the principle of no strings has carried on.
The padel racket
© Jaime de Diego/Red Bull Content Pool
05
Serving is done underarm
That's right, you serve underarm. You have to hit the ball with your racket underarm, from waist height or below, into the diagonal box opposite. It may sound odd and you may be thinking there's no attacking play and the serve is just a point starter, but the server has total control of the ball here and that means you have control over the speed, spin and direction of it. The serve sets up which shot an opponent plays next. For instance, whether the returner is forced to use the glass walls or not.
06
You're allowed to play a point outside the court
The rules of padel allow you to play a point out of the court should the ball leave the court through the two gates at either end of the net on the side of the court. This situation arises when a ball bounces over the perspex glass wall/fence and so outside the court. Players on the side the ball bounces can exit the court in order to return the ball before it bounces a second time. Exit gates around the net area are common place on padel courts used in professional tournament play and can be found on courts at a grassroot level as well.
If the ball goes out the court in padel you can still play it
© Sergi Penalba
07
It's a good workout
Padel is seen as a fairly low-impact sport. You don't need the same power as you do in tennis or squash and there's not a lot of running to be done due to the size of the court and it being doubles-based. That's not to say you don't feel the benefits of playing padel, though.
Padel matches tend to last an hour or so, making it a perfect match of aerobic and anaerobic exercise to boost cardiovascular health. It also helps improve coordination and reflexes and so has mental benefits.
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