Our national study of 645 padel players in France allowed us to deepen our knowledge of the practice of this sport in our country. We described the socio-demographic, anthropometric data and the profile of French players through a first article. We will now look at the padel playing habits of French players.

Practice methods and types of terrain 

In our study sample, the practice is preferentially done in private structures (75%) and much less in tennis clubs. Players play exclusively in private clubs in more than half of cases compared to only 22% only in tennis clubs. A minority prefer public land (association, departmental or leisure park). 

45% say they play only indoors compared to only 16% exclusively outdoors, while 39% play both indoors and outdoors. Women only practice outdoors more often (33%) compared to men (12%) (p<0,001).

The preferred playing surface is sanded synthetic turf (39%) but 46% of players play indifferently on both types of surface (with and without visible sand). We find a significant difference between the sexes on the preferred playing surface (p=0,005), the majority of women prefer a sanded surface while half of the men play on both types of surfaces. 

Laterality and position on the field

We find a predominance of right-handers at 88%, which is comparable to the distribution in the general population..

Regarding position on the pitch, almost 80% of players have a side preference, with no difference between the sexes.

  • Among right-handers, 41% prefer to play on the left side of the field, compared to 36% on the right side and 23% with no side preference. 
  • Logically, left-handers largely prefer to play on the right side (80%).

Warming up before playing? 

Before playing padel, 8 out of 10 players warm up. Warm-ups are brief and last less than 5 minutes for 55% of them. In fact, 45% say they warm up for less than 5 minutes while a third of players warm up for between 5 and 15 minutes. 

Only 12% of players warm up by running before using the racket. 

A cold warm-up of the joints of the lower limbs is carried out by 32% of players and almost as many for the upper limbs. Gentle rallies without running are performed by more than half of the players while rallies of increasing intensity with running are practiced by 29% of the players. 

In our study, a greater proportion of women did not do a warm-up (28%) compared to men (18%) without significant difference (p=0,13). The types of warm-up differ little, however..  

Stretching after padel 

After practice, 7 out of 10 players do not do any stretching (69%). A notable difference exists between the sexes (p=0,009), with women incorporating stretching more often (42%) than men (29%). 

Among the stretches performed, those of the anterior surface of the thigh (quadriceps) predominate, followed by the calf muscles, then the lumbar and shoulder muscles and finally the hamstrings.
The least practiced stretches are those of the epicondylars at the elbow and the gluteal muscles.

Almost three quarters of players are licensed by the FFT 

72% of padel players are licensed with the FFT, a third of whom have a multi-racket license (created in 2023). This high percentage can be explained quite easily by the need to be licensed to participate in approved tournaments.  

Andy Lecler

Passionate about football and tennis, I discovered padel during my medical internship. Now a rehabilitation physician specializing in sports medicine and traumatology, I share with you the detailed results of my national study on the epidemiology of padel injuries in France.

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