"To be good to be good, and not the other way around ..."Philippe BAREL" Talent "(Editions Amphora 2017)

There are a multitude of physical preparation exercises that are of interest to the player of Padel. From proprioception to flexibility, through strength or work on balance ... the modern racquet player, who is concerned about his physical integrity and constant progress, knows that setting up a training session physical is a major asset. Of course, we see that top athletes devote a large part to it in the programming of their training cycle.

According to sources (Padel magazine), there are 5 to 6 million players from Padel in the world, of which 80% of the players are Spanish or Argentinian. Fairly fun sports activity, we note that the craze for this sport is intergenerational, to use the popular expression, the padel is practiced from 7 to 77 years.

Physical preparation to play better, healthier and longer

"There is no surpassing of oneself except to understand it as a fulfillment of what nature has foreseen, not as the invention of a path, of which man would be the only measure ...”Isabelle QUEVAL“ To achieve or to surpass oneself, essay on contemporary sport ”(Editions Gallimard)

According to a study published in the "British Journal of Sports Medicine" in 2016, racket sports would be the most effective to reduce the risk of mortality, including reducing 56% cardiovascular risks.
Although several studies praise racket sports for health, the padel has biomechanical constraints, like all other sports activities, which must be mastered in order to avoid injury. These can be accidental (sprain ...) or following repeated and poorly executed movements (microtrauma, tendinopathies ...). This is where the implementation of specific physical labor takes on its protective role, which we call “prophylaxis”.
Le padel, “asymmetric” sport benefits from weight training for several reasons: To reduce muscle imbalances, to improve strength, especially transmission force (between the legs and the racquet), to improve movement speed and to improve coordination / balance.

I - Develop a functional sheathing Develop a functional sheathing:

A. Low back pain:

"All recommended protocols require lumbar and abdominal strengthening, stretching and even cardio training ... " Pascal PREVOST & Didier REISS “The bible of physical preparation” (2 ° ed., Editions Amphora)

The benefits of a physical training will be real on the treatment of the pain in the event of problems with the back, the improvements will be nervous (recruitment of motor units) and muscular (hypertrophy, work of the fast fibers).

It should be understood that in the case of low back pain, at the same point as the improvement of the performance, it is better to carry out intensive exercises rather than low intensity exercises.

Indeed, to work in imbalance or to make accelerations requires a work of the fast fibers and thus forces the posture to trigger mechanisms of postural adaptations which are called "anticipating" because programmed by the brain before the gesture itself to facilitate the performance or precision.
In the field, in FIT classesPADEL, we set up exercises on tools such as the Dynair ©, ​​the Bosu © or the TRX © in order to work on these imbalance situations which allow lumbar-abdominal strengthening and thus develop a functional cladding.

B. Improved force transmissions:

"The idea is to move your lower or upper limbs by forcing the trunk to readjust its posture at every moment ...”Pascal PREVOST & Didier REISS“ The bible of physical preparation ”(2 ° Ed., Editions Amphora)

The human body works like a puzzle, all the pieces must be in the right position and must "work" together, a muscle is always weaker than a set of muscle. Thus, we will not seek to develop impressive muscles in the biceps or shoulders, but rather to look for a correlation between the lower limbs (legs) and upper (arm, shoulders) that optimizes the force to hit the ball.

See the rest :

- Thanks to Pascal Prévost for the proofreading, the complements and the corrections of this article.
- Thanks to the athletes present in the photos and who contribute to the development of this activity.
- Thank you to Tennis Mas for their openness.
- A big thank you to my teammate Emmelien for her patience on the ground
- Thanks to Alban Serra de Padel Magazine for the FIT photoPADEL and his dedication to the world of padel
- Thanks to Baptiste Poey for his valuable advice

Claire Lefebre
Physical Coach and Founder FITPADEL

References :
⦁ "The talent"Philippe BAREL (Editions Amphora 2017)
⦁ "The Bible of physical preparation"Pascal PREVOST, Didier REISS (Editions Amphora 2017)
⦁ "Golf fitnessOlivier PAULY (Editions Amphora 2013)

 

Alban Serra

Alban Serra is one of the great chroniclers of Padel Magazine. Videographer, photographer and live-streamer, he can do just about anything. For the bandeja, it's something else, but we like it anyway!

On the same subject