So how do we win at padel? It’s the million dollar question, and perhaps one that tennis players especially ask when making the switch to this sport.

At first, for ex-tennis players, padel might seem like an easy sport since you get the impression that you don’t have to run a lot or hit powerful shots as you do in tennis. However, the fact that the ball remains in play much easier due to the walls can play havoc with newcomers to the sport. The natural instinct of most new players is to hit the ball hard to finish the point, however this is one of the worst ideas in padel.

The most important factor in playing padel is keeping the ball low.

It’s a sport that is decided by the number of mistakes one does more than the number of winners achieved. Thus, by keeping the ball low, we would be forcing our opponent into an uncomfortable return, increasing the chances that he will make a mistake or hit a high ball that would be easy for us to put away.

The video of the practice match below is shot at a very good angle that allows us to see how low the ball actually travels when the pros are playing. Although they make it look easy, return balls that are that low, at that speed and with that degree of underspin is extremely hard, unless of course you’re a pro player like them.

So there you have it, the most important factor in winning at padel is to keep the ball low and of course try to make as little mistakes as possible. In other words, try to use your head more than your physique, and the results will follow.

 

It’s time to take a reflective view of my second year as an amateur padel player. As I’ve mentioned in other posts on my blog, I am taking this journey very seriously and dedicating a lot of time and effort into becoming the best player possible. You can read the summary of my first year in padel here.

My second year of playing padel was quite intense and I feel like I’ve tried many things. I’ll start off by saying that I didn’t improve as much as I wanted to this year, so that’s a negative point. As for the rest, there was plenty to be happy about, and most of it will probably serve as a building block to my next big jump in my padel level that hopefully will happen in 2019.

I bought a car towards the end of the year and that gave me a lot more flexibility and allowed me to play at clubs that are further away from the city center. In Barcelona, the best clubs are not so centrally located, so having a car is a must really. I was deluding myself for some time thinking I could do without it, but now that I have it I’m very glad I did buy it.

In September, I underwent surgery (bone marrow biopsy) in order to investigate the sources of my anemia that showed up in the regular bloodwork I do. Thankfully, there were no important issues there, however, the surgery kept me out of action for a few weeks as I had to recover. This disrupted my flow a bit and I struggled to get back on track towards the end of the year. I also got sick with flu-like symptoms and fever on several occasions and that also conditioned me physically.

I ran the padel level test as I did at the end of last year and the results are the ones you see below. Again, I think they are slightly optimistic and I would rate myself as a 4 player not a 4.5 one, and that’s when I’m having a good day. I still need to polish many basic things especially since I haven’t transitioned to padel from another racket sport. My movement is still a bit clumsy too.

Physical Fitness

This year I really took my fitness to a different level entirely compared to what I had ever done before, and I ended the year in the best shape of my life by far.

I achieved this mostly by working with personal trainers to improve my mobility and shore up weak areas of my body. I also did a lot of work on agility, coordination and reaction time, working with tools such as agility ladders, skipping ropes, and ball grab and toss exercises.

I had always trained on my own in gyms, but training with a personal trainer was a huge difference. It made it much easier to train consistently 3-4 times a week. My personal training takes around 30 minutes, and I spend anywhere between 20-60 minutes after my session training on my own.

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The bedroom once did what it promised on the tin: there would be a bed, some furniture such as a wardrobe, drawers and maybe a dressing table or a desk. Technology changed things, first with televisions in the bedroom, and today with the multitude of devices that allow us to watch movies, listen to music, interact on social media and play video games from the comfort of our sleep kits. The bedroom has effectively become an extra living space, instead of a room for sleep.

Like the marginal-gains approach, we need to look towards stripping as much of the potential obstacles away as possible as we head towards a sleep state. And if we can’t strip them away then we need to at least learn to control their impact. Our bedrooms must become a sleep sanctuary – a mental and physical recovery room.

The Empty Shell

The first step in creating your recovery room is to start with a blank canvas, this means taking everything out of your current bedroom. You could literally do this if you felt so committed, but doing it in your head works just as well. This empty room is no longer a bedroom, nor is it an extension of your living space. Starting here, it is your mental and physical recovery room.

My first bit of advice would be to paint it white and put nothing back on the walls. We don’t want any potential stimulus in the room that a loud color scheme or pictures on the wall might provide, just a very simple, clean and neutral décor.

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What we need to ensure before a padel match is that we have an optimal reserve of glycogen. The process is known as carb-loading. Glycogen reserves are the body’s reserves of carbohydrates, and they will help us maintain our energy levels for the duration of the match.

Athletes engaged in exercise over a long period of time produce energy via two mechanisms, both facilitated by oxygen:

• via fat metabolism and
• via breakdown of glycogen into glucose, followed by glycolysis.

How much energy comes from either source depends on the intensity of the exercise. During intense exercise that approaches one’s VO₂ max, most of the energy comes from glycogen.

When you run out of glycogen during a match you hit “the wall.” Your body has to slow down as it turns fat into energy, and this can lead to weak legs and fainting sensations. That is why we need to make sure to take care of our glycogen levels.

For breakfast tortillas, oatmeal, bread, pancakes, waffles, bagels, yogurt, and juice are all easy-to-digest options. Many fruits are high in carbs but are also high in fiber—and too much can cause stomach trouble mid-match. Bananas are a low-fiber choice and you can peel apples, peaches, and pears to reduce their fiber content.

The main meal before the match should be taken around 2-4 hours before, and we should eat carb-based food with a high glycemic index. Having a high glycemic index means that the carbs are rapidly absorbed.  Carbohydrates are key with a moderate amount of protein, adding in some antioxidants if possible.

Try a pasta/rice dish with some lean ground turkey meat sauce, or a chicken stir-fry with lots of rice and veggies. We should be looking at between 1 and 4g of carbs for every kg of body weight, eaten 3-4 hours before the match. In the hour preceding the match, if we haven’t yet taken our full ingestion of carbs, or simply feel hungry, we can eat 30-60g of carbs. If we ate more than that, we would be risking going in with a heavy stomach that will impair our performance.

Some typical snacks for pre-match are Gatorade Energy Chews and PowerBar Energy Blasts or simply fruit.

Keep in mind that it is also very important to stay well hydrated throughout the day of your match. Monitor urine color on game day. It sounds silly, but you want it in the light lemonade or even clear shade. If you get into the apple juice shades, hydration levels are lacking.

What to Avoid Before Matches

How you fuel your body before a game or practice can still have major performance benefits. Here are some items to avoid eating as part of a pregame meal.

• Fatty foods. It seems easy, but athletes often forget to steer clear of any high-fat foods. That includes fried foods – including French fries, chicken strips, fried chicken and onion rings – and fatty cuts of meat such as hamburgers and bacon. Steer clear of high-fat foods—like creamy sauces, cheese, butter, and oils—as well as too much protein. Both nutrients fill you up faster than carbs and take longer to digest, she says. Pick jam—not butter—for your toast, tomato sauce in lieu of alfredo sauce on your pasta, and frozen yogurt instead of ice cream for dessert.
• Too much protein. Normally, protein sounds good, and it does play an important role in a football player’s overall diet, but not in large quantities before a game. So, stay away from protein shakes or protein bars. You can find a good amount of pregame protein in other ways.
• Artificial sweeteners. Be careful with artificial sweeteners. They can mess with digestion, and the last thing anyone wants during a game is an upset stomach.

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Is it time for new padel shoes? Should you own more than one pair of padel shoes? Just which padel shoes should you buy anyway? Since your shoes are the only thing that comes between you and the court surface, they’re pretty important.

If you’ve been shopping for padel shoes lately, then you know – there are tons of options out there. New manufacturers are getting into the court shoe game pretty frequently now. I dropped by my own local padel retailer this week just to buy some overgrips for my racket. Next thing I knew, I had been lured into the shoe department by all of the pretty colors and fancy designs.

The Importance of Your Padel Shoes

Why is it important to wear padel shoes?

I often see players wearing running shoes to play padel. And I bet a lot of you do too. And if you’re one of those players who feels most comfortable playing padel in running shoes, I certainly do not have a problem with that. I think you should play in whatever makes you feel like you’re playing your best padel and if it happens to be running shoes that make you happy, then that’s what you should wear.

But for the vast majority of us, it’s pretty important to wear court shoes. That is, to wear shoes that are specifically designed for padel. This is because these shoes are made to give you the support, the cushioning and, most important, the traction that you need on a padel court.

We all know that padel requires, not just a lot of running around, but it requires that you make quick starts and stops, it requires a lot of lateral movement, and so padel shoes are made to provide you with exactly the type of support and cushioning that you need in these situations. And the traction that you need on a padel court is certainly much different than you would need if you were running, even if you’re out running on a road, because you do have these short starts and stops, quick steps, small steps, longer lunging steps, and so a padel shoe is really made to provide you with the best possible shoe for those special situations.

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