Two or three facts about padel.

Padel comes from the Spanish word pádel, which in turn comes from the English word paddle and is a ball sport derived from tennis. It is played in pairs in a rectangular court, enclosed by walls on four sides. The game is played with a racket with a rigid plate and a ball that is externally identical to the tennis ball, but with a lower internal pressure, for a greater control of the shots and rebounds.

In 1969, the Mexican Enrique Corcuera, wanted to build a paddle tennis court in his home, but since there were walls right next to the court he conceived of considering the walls as part of the playing court. Hence came the regulation and the name of Padel.

In Italy this sport is managed by FIT.

In professional tournaments the walls are made of glass to let the audience see the game actions. The court is 20 m long and 10 m wide, with a wall 3 m high on most sides and 4 m on the back wall. To begin, the point is hit behind one’s service line, from underneath (unlike tennis) and bouncing the ball first on the ground, and the serve must follow a diagonal trajectory to the opponent’s opposite serving area. Players can hit the ball by catching it on the fly or after the first bounce on their court. Players can send the ball against the glass portion of the wall in their own half of the court for the ball to go over the net to the opponent’s court. Once over the net, the ball must always bounce on the ground first to be in play.

Most of the basic padel strokes are borrowed from tennis and are the common forehand, backhand, volley and serve (here only from below).

• bandeja: a widely used overhead shot that basically consists of a high forehand volley or is hit flat and level so as to keep the rebound low;
• vibora: a kind of dampened smash that is more aggressive than the bandeja because it is driven by a whirling movement of the forearm;
• globo: the padel lob, very frequent to gain the net from a defensive situation; very high and deep;
• dejada: similar to the dropshot in tennis, it is a short muffled ball used by the net player to catch opponents off guard;
• chiquita: an alternative to the lob to get the net player in trouble, it usually consists of a less powerful shot played on the opponent’s feet taking advantage of the far corner;
• bajada: a bandeja played out of the wall;
• cuchilla: a vibora played out of the wall;
• x3: a smash very similar to the tennis serve, executed with the kick technique, in which the ball, after bouncing on the opponent’s court and on the back wall, exits laterally from the side wall of the court (3 m high);
• x4: a smash that bounces so high that it goes over the back wall (4 m high) and exits the court, making any attempt at recovery impossible.

From an execution point of view, most padel shots are executed with a continental (or hammer) type grip. This is because shots are almost always used flat to generate little rebound.

There was a definite moment in my life when I thought this was the sport for me, because it is a mixture of elegance and strength, speed and strategy, leading to immediate and unique emotions.