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BBC News
01-06-2025
- General
- BBC News
Padel: The emerging racquet sport booming in Wales
The emerging racquet sport of padel is growing so fast that courts "will be full for the next 10-15 years", the national governing body for tennis has - a blend of tennis and squash - was invented in Mexico in 1969 but in recent years has grown in popularity, with an estimated 30 million players across the Cymru said it expected there would be 4,500 padel players in Wales by the end of 2025, and more than 6,000 by Wheatley, 64, from Cardiff, who has been playing the sport for more than four years, said he wished he had found it "20 years ago". "I was getting to an age where squash was becoming too much for me and my bones were aching," said Mr Wheatley."So I was looking to play tennis, and I'd been to Spain and I'd seen this game [padel] and I thought 'that would be lovely in the UK, but it's never going to happen'." Mr Wheatley said he bumped into a friend who told him about a padel court in Penarth that was open to non-members."He invited me along for a taster and it's just gone from there," he said."It's a fabulous game, it really is."It's got the element of squash in it with the ball coming off the glass at the back, and the tennis side of it as well."It's super sociable, and a game where you can just play some amazing shots. It's good fun, it's good exercise." What is padel? is a racquet sport that uses the same scoring conventions as lawn tennis but is played on courts around a third game is mainly played in the doubles format, with players using solid racquets with no strings. The courts are enclosed and, like in squash, players can bounce the ball off the balls are smaller than those used in tennis and players serve game was created by Mexican businessman Enrique Corcuera and his wife Viviana as they enjoyed their holiday home in Las Brisas, a suburb of couple began throwing a ball at a wall, and Viviana quickly fell in love with the rudimentary version of the game.A court measuring 20m (65ft) long by 10m (32ft) wide was built out of cement, making it easy to maintain, with walls of up to four metres (13ft) on each side to prevent balls from escaping onto neighbouring sport soon caught on abroad, reaching Europe and the UK. In 1992 the British Paddle Association was formed and since then the sport has grown throughout Britain, In 2020 Tennis Wales was recognised as the national governing body for padel in are now county championships held in Wales and Tennis Wales hopes to host international competitions in the future. The sport is considered inclusive, open to people of all ages and abilities and played on a smaller Llewelyn, from Swansea, started playing after a court opened in the city."Me, my sister and a couple of friends thought 'let's give this a go', and we played, and we didn't get off for four hours because it was so much fun."We didn't know any rules, we didn't understand the glass, we were just whacking the ball back and forth and it was really fun, and then we started playing once a week."The 31-year-old has now been playing for a year and a half and said for her 30th birthday they went to Malaga and played all weekend."I think it's quite a fast game, so if you turn up you can just get into it."You don't have to serve like tennis, because I can't serve, so I couldn't hold my own in a tennis game."But with the underarm serve it's so easy to pick up and it's so much easier to find three other girls to play with."We used to play netball together, we couldn't find 14 girls but we could find three." There are around 17 padel courts in Wales at the moment. Four years ago there was only one, but now there are plans to double the current number to 32 by the end of has already started on a new padel court in Llandaff in Cardiff, one of the many new courts that have popped up in the capital city over the last few chair for Tennis Cymru, Hywel Lewis, said: "Growth is going to come down to the number of courts and venues because we can only get so many people on court at the moment."If you compare the number of courts we have to tennis or squash we're very much a minority sport at the moment."But in terms of participation it's such an engaging sport and so easy for everyone to get involved, I think that we'll fill the courts, however many courts get created, for the next 10 to 15 years at least."
Telegraph
14-05-2025
- Sport
- Telegraph
‘Padel has made my life a living hell. It's like being at the Somme'
At 75, Jenni Chilvers expected to be spending more time in her garden. But this week, when the sun was shining in a cloudless blue sky, temperatures were nudging into the 70s and the wisteria was cascading down the front of the house like a glorious mauve waterfall, she barely set foot out of doors. Chilvers is a victim of the latest blight to hit the leafy suburbs of Middle England. Her home, in a quiet cul-de-sac in Winchester, Hampshire, one of England's oldest cities, backs on to three padel courts. If you had not yet heard of padel, it was only a matter of time. It is the world's fastest-growing racquet sport; some, including the Lawn Tennis Association, even claim it is the world's fastest-growing sport, full stop. Everyone agrees it is good to get people active, and padel appeals to players of all ages and abilities. The problem is the noise. If there is anything louder than the grunts and exclamations of a padel player in full flight, it is the crack of the padel ball against the bat or the glass sides of the court. The sound has been likened to a volley of gunshots. The players evidently swear a lot, too. The sport is played with bats made of hard, expanded, foam-like, large table tennis racquets – and as the court is smaller than a tennis court, the volleys are faster and more furious. The ball can also be played off the walls and even, if the player is quick enough, from outside the court. Peter Chilvers, Jenni's husband, at 82 semi-retired from his job as a building surveyor, says his wife is particularly susceptible to noise. Even in summer, they have to keep the windows closed as the padel courts are in use from 8am to 9pm seven days a week. He says he tries to grit his teeth and ignore the, pardon the pun, racket. Mr Chilvers says: 'My wife is ultra-sensitive about the noise. It spoils her enjoyment in the garden. I kind of put up with it. If you get all the courts used at once by good players, it's like being on the Somme: boom, boom, boom, boom.' Mrs Chilvers says: 'At first, they tried to argue that padel is no louder than tennis, but that's manifestly untrue. Last year, I was very unwell and I'd try to have a rest in the afternoon, but there was the shouting and the thwacking when the ball hits the bat, the wall or the fence. When you have all three courts being used, it's unbearable, it's dreadful. In the house, with the windows closed and the curtains drawn, you can still hear it. 'We are probably worse affected than anybody because it's literally at the end of the garden.' The couple has noticed a difference between tennis players and padel players. Peter says: 'It does attract a different crowd. Tennis players are normally well behaved, but there's a lot of shouting and swearing from padel players. For the world, padel is probably a good innovation, because it's exercise and people get involved and seem to like it, but not when it's in your back garden.' The Chilverses' home adjoins the Winchester Racquets and Fitness (WRF) Club, which has been there since 1910, 60 years before padel was invented by Enrique Corcuera, a businessman from Acapulco, Mexico, who converted his squash court. Padel spread first through Latin America and Spain and then caught on among expats on the Costas, who brought it back to Britain. Said to be easier and less demanding than tennis, padel is an enjoyable way to get exercise. As it is usually played as a doubles game with four people, it can also be more sociable. Since 2011, when the first padel court was built in Britain, more than 140 padel clubs have sprung up, along with 760 courts. There are hundreds more in the planning pipeline. The issue of noise has been one of the biggest constraints, and several tennis clubs in residential areas have been forced to withdraw or amend applications to convert tennis courts to padel courts. The changeover has also pitched padelistas against more traditional tennis players worried about losing facilities to their rivals. The incentive for the clubs is that they can fit more padel courts in and therefore generate more revenue. Padel wars have broken out in middle-class ghettos such as St George's Hill in Surrey; Bath; Cheltenham; Lytham St Annes, Lancashire; and Enfield and Hampstead in London. The WRF has been issued with a noise abatement order by Winchester city council, which requires the club to propose an acceptable solution within six months. It was issued at the end of January and the club has six months to say what it intends to do to comply. Tim and Ruth Cooling moved to a large detached house that backs on to the WRF club so they could play their favourite sports without having to commute. He is now a keen padel player as well as captain of the squash team. He says the noise is noticeable but not a problem for someone who grew up with a railway line at the bottom of the garden. He thinks the long-term solution is to cover the padel courts possibly with a translucent 'bubble' like the one that covers several of the tennis courts. 'At the moment, the courts are out of action if it's raining or if it's very gusty, and the club loses revenue when they are not in use. The initial cost would be more expensive, but they do have to do something about the noise anyway.' Mr Cooling, an NHS manager, says: 'Padel has emerged as a sociable sport for people who enjoy racquet sports but either find tennis too technically tricky or want to step back from the intensity of playing a game like squash. 'It's still moving your body, you're still raising your heart rate and it's easy to learn. Tennis is hard to learn. With squash you are trying hard not to have a heart attack. 'Padel is fun to play and more accessible, and it's just gaining in popularity. 'Padel courts are springing up all over the place in Winchester. The politics of it are that padel is growing in popularity, but with space at a premium, padel courts are having to be built on tennis courts – and tennis members are militantly getting themselves organised to try to block them. They are militarily organised here. They will flood committees with people who are not sympathetic to padel to block expansion of the game. 'Tennis members don't want to lose tennis courts; padel members want more padel courts because they are hard to book as it's very popular. Clubs are a bit stuck because they are trying to please all their members and they are trying to think about what's going to work financially and try not to lose the ethos of what their club is there to do. 'The problem that we have here is going to be echoed all across the land. They are trying to balance having this new, popular sport with a finite amount of land with this noise thing in the background as well.' Unlike sports such as golf, padel is economically accessible. Bats, the most expensive item of equipment, cost from £50 to £500 for the more sophisticated versions. Unlike with the higher echelons of tennis, there's no uniform and balls can be bought for £4.99 each. Prada has recently launched a sleek black padel bat for £1,530, but that's probably not going to make you a better player – just a poorer one. There are already an estimated 90,000 players in the UK and the number will only increase if the sport is included in the 2032 Olympics, if the International Padel Federation gets its way. One woman leaving a large new-build property shielded from the WRF only by a 20ft-high hedge says she no longer needs an alarm clock in the mornings. At 8am, without fail, the grunting and thwacking starts. She said: 'It's the 40-year-old men getting rid of their frustrations.' Having a 'padel problem' is not going to earn residents of the leafier parts of Winchester a huge amount of sympathy. Think ' first world problems '. Tim Cooling admits: 'It's a difficult case to carry off, because no one cares about people who live in million-pound-plus houses who have a bit of noise at the bottom of the garden. It does drift quite quickly into 'what a nice problem to have' territory.' Winchester Racquets and Fitness did not respond to a request for a comment but it clearly recognises the game can create something of a racket. Recently, it objected to a housing development on the site of a former old people's home next to the courts. In its letter to the council, it says that it has 'always sought to co-exist harmoniously with its residential neighbours but has received complaints about noise from the use of the padel courts'. The WRF said this matter was being taken 'very seriously' and that it was in the process of 'investigating options and means of reducing noise impact'. If the application were allowed, however, there would be a 'high risk of a significant adverse noise impact on the residents from the legitimate operation of the WRF's padel courts'. And before planning is granted, the council should be 'satisfied that the proposed residential scheme and the WRF may co-exist without causing significant adverse noise impact on the future occupants of the proposed development'. It is an irony that Mr Chilvers, whose living room was built long before padel was invented, is keen to point out as bish-bash-bosh echoes in the background.
