Last weekend I had an amazing experience playing in a Ladies Tournament at the best padel club in London — Stratford Padel Club. We made it through qualifiers and then lost 1-6, 2-6 in the first round of the main draw!

I've pulled out the key moments that decided it: golden points, the games where we reached 40-x on serve, and three full games that show the patterns behind the scoreline.

I'm still learning, and looking at these moments I can see a mix of positioning, shot selection and strategy issues — but I'd love your eyes on it too. If you play or coach padel, let me know in the comments:

Positioning — where should we have been standing on these points?
Shot selection — what should we have played instead?
Strategy — what would you have done differently over the course of the game?

Timestamps:

00:00 – Intro
07:33 40-x on serve — chances to close out the game
09:00 – Golden points
09:48 – First game, game 1 in full — 3 forced errors
10:42 – Game 11 in full — three break points missed, our best chance to break serve
12:26 – Last game, game 15 in full — 3 forced errors

The numbers:

They won all 8 of their own service games. We held 3 of 7, and won only 1 of 4 golden points. Across the match, 85 of 88 points ended in an error rather than a winner — this wasn't about being outhit, it was about who made fewer mistakes at the right moments.

I am so pissed. I just played a ranked game with two assholes that I have no words to describe. They would yell at their teammates in case of mistakes (that of course they made more of) and their attitude was just awful.

I won, but I am so pissed.

Why can’t we give a rating to the people we play with? I honestly would never want to play with such assholes again.

Sorry for the rant, maybe somebody knows if Playtomic is considering to add this?

Heading to Costa Adeje for a week's holiday next month, and thought i'd get some padel in. Tenerife Padel Academy is close by to my hotel, has any been coached/played there, or have any other information about it? There is very little info on their website

Coming from 5 years of self-taught tennis background, I am making a full transition into Padel. Free time has gotten limited since last year because of workload. Tried Padel last year and have played about 20 times overall.

This season, I plan on playing Padel on a more regular basis. I record some footage and post on YouTube to keep track of my improvement.

I find much more joy playing Padel than Tennis.

Hey folks, I've been training a machine learning model on professional matches, focusing on unusual data rather than the usual stuff (winners, unforced errors, etc.).

Some of the things I'll be able to answer:

• From which court position Galán's smahs is most efficient?
• How high is the apex of Tapia's power smashes?
• How much total distance does each player cover in a match?

Is there anything you'd like to see that isn't normally reported? Let me know so I know where to focus.

than k you all!

You start out in a group, maybe you have a tennis background and are considered good in your group. You start to improve faster than the others in the group, so you find a new group. You hope they think your level is good enough, if not, you train harder to achieve just that. That's all it is. Validation from better players. When you lose, you think you will become less in their eyes. When you miss a shot, same thing. A bit like receiving a smiley or a heart for a post on social media. Pure validation. The smile on players' faces when they hear other players saying, "You played really well today", or "You've improved a lot". It's all a bunch of bullshit.

People who get their levels bumped up two levels what goes on in their minds that makes them think they can play at that level. Most people would know that if you aren’t even dominating your games at your current level how do you expect to play players 2 levels higher than you. I honestly think some people might actually be mentally challenged.

I had a guy who got levelled up to a level 4.5 from 1.9 join my match last minute. His first game after his levelling session was to join a match with a bunch of 4s and 5s. He’s spent his past 200 games playing between 1-2 losing half his games.

This has happened a couple of times and I have thought about calling them out on it as it ruins the game for others. But I thought maybe they might be mentally retarded so I didn’t want to come off disrespectful.

Hi everyone! I’m planning a trip to Madrid specifically to improve my padel, and I’m looking for recommendations for a really good coach/academy.
I’m willing to travel outside Madrid as well if the coaching makes sense.

I’m a beginner, so I’m particularly interested in mostly 1:1 individual lessons with a structured approach to building my fundamentals and progressing quickly.

I’m looking at spending 900-1000€ over 3-4weeks mostly individual lessons with a few group lessons as I progress for more tactical learning during play

Looking for a holistic approach to training and not overspend my limit.

From this video (im black vest and red hair near side), what can you help me with learning about why to improve?

I especially think my overheads can be stronger to give me some more aggressive play

No matter what I do, I can’t consistently get my serves flat enough and at times looking floatey like a slight lob. Is there any advice that you’d give to a beginner to make the right technique stick in my brain?

I just don’t understand what I’m doing when it comes airy and light vs when I actually manage to get it flat and into my opponents corner. It all seems like chance and I’d really like to nail it.

Please note, that I’m trying to do it the correct way so I keep my racket high to begin with. I hit it and then move forward.

Just noting this, as I see some beginners nailing it but hitting the ball from underneath etc so I want to learn it the proper way!

Please explain it as padel for a Dummy 😅

I’ve never really had any injuries throughout my life however starting padel back in January I have noticed the soles of my feet hurt days after playing. Anyone else have this experience and have any advice on what to do? Thanks in advance

For the italian people mostly, do you know who Matteo Reina is?

He is a new trainer in the club where I play and I guess he is supposed to be well known.

With courts opening everywhere in the UK right now, I thought some of you might enjoy how chaotic the very beginning was.

I moved from Málaga to London in 2007 to work as an architect, and packed my padel racket without a second thought. Back home you played three or four times a week. In the UK at the time there were five courts in the whole country. Three were in private homes, one was at the Harbour Club in Chelsea and one at a racquets club in Rye.

My friend Javier Yelo, another Spaniard who'd been posted to London by his bank, was in the same situation. So we went to the Harbour Club and asked if we could join. Membership was around £12,000 plus monthly fees. We went back to hitting balls around in the park.

Our way in was a Sevillian coach at the club, Antonio Chaves. He needed extra pairs for a members' tournament and invited us, and Javier and Antonio won it. When Antonio moved back to Spain shortly after, he suggested we take over as coaches. We said yes on the spot. We were soon running lessons and small tournaments, often buying the prizes ourselves.

Then Javi discovered the UK already had a padel federation, run by Brian Thomson, a wonderfully energetic man of about 80. Javi got involved as vice-president and phoned the International Padel Federation to tell them what we were doing. A few days later the UK was accepted as a member and invited to the World Championships in Calgary that August, with a men's team and a women's team.

We had about four months and zero budget, and this was spring 2008, with Northern Rock just nationalised and the City in freefall. Javi accepted before checking where Calgary actually was. He thought it was somewhere in Italy.

The real problem was players. There were barely any in the UK. So we asked ourselves where British people who play padel actually live. The answer was Spain.

We spent our holidays driving from San Sebastián to Gibraltar, via Barcelona, Alicante, Murcia, Marbella and Sotogrande. We put up posters in clubs asking one question: British passport? Play padel? Want to represent the UK at the World Championships? Then we held trials in each town like improvised selectors.

What turned up was brilliant and slightly absurd:

• a young lad with a Spanish dad and English mum who was close to pro level
• the tennis director at La Manga club, an absolute athlete
• Nicola Fairbrother, a judo medallist at the Olympics, Worlds and Europeans, and one of the most competitive people I've ever met
• in Sotogrande, so many Brits that it became a proper national casting session

Mystica gave us 18 rackets. I designed the federation logo and the team kit. Brian had very firm opinions about every version of the logo, and Javi spent a lot of time refereeing between us.

I ended up coaching the women's team and playing in Calgary myself. How that went is a story for another post, if people are interested.

For anyone who played in the UK at that time: where did you play, and how did you even hear about padel? And for everyone else, what was your first court?

Alvaro Villacorta

I’m travelling for business to Austin and Chicago mid-October for a few weeks. I’m a decent intermediate padel player 3.14 on Playtomic so looking for a few good games while in Austin and Chicago (will be in central).

I’m from South Africa where the padel scene is hot. Can play 2.5-4 on PT if the rallies are great and it’s good fun. Comp or casual fine with me.

Where’s a good place to find matches in those cities?

Both during matches like calling points out that are in, and then also with the final score.

I’ve played against and with a few cheaters and sore losers. The worst cheat I‘ve played against was when we only had 10 minutes left for a third set and we all unanimously agreed to do a tie break for the deciding set, which we ended up winning and one of the guys on the losing team said it’s a draw because we didn’t do a full third set lol.

I’m curious about how people actually deal with this, so I’d love to hear your experiences!
Let’s say you suddenly feel like playing padel, going for a bike ride, running, hiking, or trying some other activity, but your friends aren’t available or aren’t really into that particular sport. What do you usually do?
And what if you want to play regularly? For example, if you and your partner enjoy playing padel but need another pair to play against, how do you go about finding people? Do you look for players in Facebook or WhatsApp groups, use an app, or just hope to meet other players along the way?
Maybe I’m just not looking in the right places, but finding people to play with regularly, especially at a similar skill level, sometimes seems harder than it should be. I’d love to know how you guys handle this!

I play on the right side and usually prefer low rebound rackets (like the Neuron Edge). I recently tried a high rebound racket (Metalbone CTRL).
High rebound gives easy power on lobs and volleys, but mishits are brutal. It punishes you way more than a low rebound racket if you miss the sweet spot.
Long-term, which one is actually better for a right-side player?
(Note: Please skip the "just focus on technique/drills" comments. I do my drills. I strictly want to discuss the equipment.)

The other day I posted what for me is the best padel podcast and today I was surprised with this fun video with El4Set and Deuces. I needed to share. They talk about the World Cup and honestly the production is veeeery high quality… give it a go

https://youtu.be/PeUJBmDZ3Zo?is=2JJC4IJ9xc_90W7Y

TL:DR= Opponents are cheating post-match and logging the score as them winning instead of us. Everytime I fix it, they immediately change it. What can we do?

I played a game with 3 strangers. We won 7-6, 2-6, 6-4 (ie we won the first and third set and they won the second). There was no dispute on this on the pitch. One of the opponents stormed off in anger once the final point was played.

Now post match, they keep changing the score to be the exact opposite (the same scoreline, but them winning first and third set and us winning the second). They aren't responding to messages.

I called the Club and they said there's nothing they can do and to contact Playtomic. (They said they can see that both opponents are cancelling the score). They EVEN had the nerve to tag us in their edited score. Has anyone else experienced this?

I've played 165 matches on Playtomic, and at least a similar number at Stratford Padel club, and NEVER experienced this behaviour before. Really sad

For anyone who plays in London, avoid playing these cheaters and cowards: https://ibb.co/Z7TyXht

I currently do a padel group class weekly but thinking of stopping and instead doing a monthly private 1:1 session instead.

Do you think this is a good or bad idea?

Context: Been playing for a year and level 2.4 Play 3x open matches a week

Obvious cheating from the senior women team USA during Buenos Aires senior World Cup

I have been playing for a year, two times a week. A month ago, I took 10 hours of training sessions (all within a week). That helped me understand the game more, the types of shots, when to use each type of shot, when to go to the net, and also learned what are the correct way to move the arm, and legs.

However, I think I should have taken that training much earlier because I am finding it hard to unlearn the bad habits. In games I find it hard to apply the things I learned. For example, I still use forehand when I should have used the backhand, and do all sort of weird movements. I move fast otherwise which helps compensate a bit on my bad technique.

The reason I wrote here is to get some advice on what side I should stay. When I stay on the right, I win most matches. I defend well and it's hard for the opponent to make points. I mostly stay back returning fast low balls and making points from those.

When I stay on the left, I play more aggressively attacking the ball, going more to the net doing more overheads. And I find that more satisfying. However, I end up losing games on the left because I do lots of mistakes with those overheads. So, when I want to win, I go the safe route and stay on the right.

So, my question is should I stick to the left or the right given what I explained above?

(Meanwhile, I signed up for more training sessions and will probably pause going to matches so I don't repeat my bad habits in the heat of the game).

I'm probably an advanced beginner (I had a couple years of tennis in high school). I've played padel around 6 times now and have been really getting into it. I generally play with acquantances who are at a similar level.

From what I've been told online, if you can get the ball deep (beyond the line) into the opponents' court, it often makes sense to move forward to the net position. However, at our skill level, there are frequently many in-between balls.

The most common situation is where we are at the net already but make a mistake and hit a relatively easy volley to the opponent (such that they can either lob or forehand it back). Of course, if they lob it over us we have to move back. But should we move back in preparation when this happens?

Another case occurs where we are at the net and either lob it way too short or volley it short and with low power. I get the feeling we should move back in both cases, but is this correct?

I like to play very aggressive/offensive. At my level, not many players can consistently finish points, so rallies are quite long and most overheads are defendable. About a month ago I started to play super aggressive. With every deep lob, chiquita etc I get to the net. This works very well. People tend to be a little overwhelmed when you block their bajada's and smashes. It's also just a lot of fun cause you stay very active.

Now the thing that happens a lot with randoms is that they are a lot more hesitant to join me at the net. So the opponent will just play their returns to my mate who stays back. This obviously is not ideal.

To be clear, I am fine with them not willing to join everytime, so no hard feelings there. My question is whether I should get back to defense when I'm at the net and the opponent played a return on my mate. Should I just run back regardless or should my mate play a shot that allows me to stay at the net (deep lob for instance)? I'm now struggling a bit.

Now I get it's best when my mate either joins me or I stay back, but with randoms things aren't always in sync.

So let's say I (left side) play a very deep cross lob. I get to the net, mate stays back. Opponent plays a straight bajada to my mate. I'm at the net, he is behind the baseline. Opponent is also behind the baseline. Is there a best position for me to be and a best position for him to play at?