For his first professional and international season, Manuel Vives, French number 14 in april ranking, come back for Padel Magazine on his collaboration with the famous Spanish brand Black Crown.

First contract with an equipment supplier

“My partnership with Black Crown took place following my departure for Spain to take part in the various international stages. Who says departure, says sponsor to finance this season. And the first thing that players who do not have a contract do is go in search of a collaboration with an equipment manufacturer. This year I am lucky to be followed by Robin Haziza, who is my agent and who has a very important network with brands. After several proposals, it is with Black Crown that we have decided to join forces.”

“This is my first professional contract with an equipment manufacturer.”

“A relationship of trust with Black Crown"

"For what Black Crown ? We discussed it at length with Robin and of course the financial aspect weighed in the balance. But above all because the feeling went well. Robin knowing the brand managers very well. He introduced me to Jordi Rovirosa and the current immediately passed. And that's how we decided to collaborate with them. In addition, their factory is in Barcelona so it was easier for me to try the different palas.

Nevertheless they are not the only ones to have trusted me because part of my contract binds me to Black Crown and another part is done with racket-padel.com, Vincent Brunet's boutique. After a few exchanges, I felt a relationship of trust was developing and that confirmed my decision."

“I love the sensations of this pala”

“After having tried all the palas of the brand, I opted for the Black Crown Python 11 because for my part my main search criterion is foam. In fact, I'm looking first and foremost for the hardest rubber possible because I've always gotten used to playing with hard rackets. I like the sensations these palas give me.”

“The particularity of this Python 11 is its shape. As you could see it is round but thanks to the foam which composes it it is incredible for the aerial game which remember-is one of my main weapons. Its shape also gives it a certain significant control which makes it a very complete pala combining power thanks to its output of the ball and control of the game by its round frame.

"And I'm not saying that because I'm at Black Crown but it's a great racket for offensive players, and I recommend it.”

“Continue to evolve on the international circuit”

“I've had a lot of tournaments over the past few weeks, which involves a lot of travel, so a lot of hours by plane. It's the dream life but you have to admit that it's exhausting because when you have to go far, for financial reasons, you don't take a direct flight, which lengthens the hours of travel. Regarding the results, we can say that we are rather satisfied with ourselves with Dylan. We managed to win Kaunas FIP Promotion, then we managed to snag some well-ranked pairs.

However, we must recognize that lately we have had a little more trouble, surely the end of a cycle. I will focus for a month on training in Barcelona. Indeed I think I have chained a little too much and I feel this need to settle down and train thoroughly. My objective is to continue over the long term to train in Spain and to evolve on the international circuits. And that takes a lot of work.”

Vives guichard victory fip Kaunas

“Surely miss a P2000”

“My next two tournaments will be two Star FIPs, one in Cairo and the other in Riyadh at the beginning of May, which implies that I will surely miss a P2000 again but we cannot afford to miss such big FIPs .”

Sebastien Carrasco

Future naturopath and passionate about padel, Seb is the health/food gentleman of Padel Magazine. He juggles between pala, quinoa and essential oils. For almost two years now he has been dealing with the news of the little yellow ball with the same passion.

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