Julien Seurin: “My main objective, to be able to enter all the tournaments Premier Padel”| Padel Magazine

Julien Seurin shares his changes in partners, the challenges he encounters and his ambitions. Also discover his racket preferences at Kuikma and his desires for the French team!

A start to 2023 marked by changes in partners

At the start of 2023, I committed to Ludovic Cancel for the long term, then ultimately, we had different projects. In reality, it was mainly me who wanted to change partners, and then we had planned things and it didn't necessarily go well.

Then, I had a great opportunity with Bastien Blanqué which was positive. When the Premier Padel resumed, Bastien found a partner to be able to enter these tournaments because I couldn't enter, that's partly why we stopped our collaboration, we had too many points difference. That's why afterwards I played with Manuel Vives with whom it went really well. I would say that the small negative points are these 3 or 4 matches that we lose against better ranked pairs, we are not far from winning and ultimately, we do not get through it.

It was the most difficult moments of the season to manage. We have good matches each time and each time we are not far from winning, but we do not win.

For this year, so far things are going pretty well. In Australia, it went well. We decided to change the horizon a little with Manu, we spoke at the start of the year to try to potentially find a partner with a little more experience to help us win these famous matches that we don't have managed to win last year. He accepted Jérôme Inzerillo's proposal to do the French Championships and I also had to find a partner for the French Championships. He also had the objective of being able to play the Premier Padel to the maximum. I have even fewer points than him so it seemed even more complicated, that's why I decided engaged with Adrien Maigret.

Not always easy to find a player with the same project

It's difficult to get into Premier Padel, then we will do the FIP together. For now, the difficulty is managing the same project as your partner, because sometimes we have the same project and we don't necessarily have the same points. That's what I find the most complicated to manage. I think Adrien is motivated by the deadlines in the France team and he told me that it motivated him to have a fairly serious project with a stable player. He didn't want to go back to the FIPs trying to find a teammate at each tournament. I believe that this project that we built together motivated him. The first 3/4 FIPs that we have planned, we will do them together.

The French team in the lead?

I think there is less of this supremacy of the eight compared to previous years. I think there are quite a few players behind us. I think I'm part of this group of players who are very close. For my part, there is Benjamin Tison who left, but there is also Johan Bergeron who returned for once and who plays on the right at the start of the season. I think that Dylan Guichard also is well placed, better placed than me in fact I think.

So it remains to be seen, it is not a main objective for me, at least not at the beginning/middle of the year, perhaps at the end of the year. The year is really long and for the moment it's not necessarily my main objective, but we definitely think about it a little. With Benjamin and Dylan, that made two left-handers on the right, I found it complicated to add a third, but now that Benjamin is no longer there, that obviously leaves a little more hope.

Enter the highest sphere

My main objective would be to be able to enter all the tournaments Premier Padel, to be able to play the highest level circuit and really feel that I am in the professional world, where I know my calendar at the start of the year, I know all the trips that I am going to make and I am not there fighting all the time the weeks to choose which tournament I will do next week. I would like to stop fighting about flights and really enter the highest sphere. I think we should be around 120th place in the world. That's really the goal right now.

Which racket in 2024?

Until now, I played with the Kuikma MS Pro, the pala of Maxi Sanchez. It is diamond-shaped, quite heavy, but still balanced in the handle. I like to have maneuverability in my rackets and it's true that I would love to be on the offensive side, but defensively, it was a bit complicated. There is a new range of racquets coming out, I am trying different models, I have not yet made a final choice.

But whatever happens, it won't be a diamond shape anymore. I'm going to go back to something more manageable, either a hybrid shape, or a round shape that I liked before playing with the MS Pro. For the moment I’m playing with the round shape, I’m waiting to be able to test the hybrids before making my final choice.”

Dorian Massy

New follower of padel, I am fascinated by this dynamic sport which combines strategy and agility. I find in the padel a new passion to explore and share with you on Padel Magazine.