A record breaking 143 student padel players competed in thirty-seven teams in the first ever UK PADEL Universities Championships at Rocket Padel Bristol 1-2nd February

“We hope that next year it can be at least double the size” says Nick Baker CEO of UK PADEL. “The vision in launching this event, a bit like our promotion of school’s events, was that we want to create a future set of events and want to be tapping into the upcoming players of the future and Universities have always had a very strong sporting tradition. Support and encourage universities to show their talent in a new sport in the UK with the best run events going.”

UK PADEL made the decision last year to add a nationwide universities event and to make it free to enter. It was a key barrier to jump over to get younger people having a taste of padel and we were delighted that Sponsors AmplifyME and Lauralu came onboard to support this vision and help provide free entry. Sponsorship support has been really positive for UK PADEL events who think the future is bright and we would encourage anyone who is thinking about getting their company involved as a sponsor to step forward and explore, the opportunity at this stage of the growth in the UK is nothing short of phenomenal https://ukpadel.org/brand-partnerships-with-uk-padel/

Director of Events Mark Ayers said “We want to raise the profile of padel, make people aware of what it is, and really push the idea of it as a fun form of exercise. Hiring one of the biggest and best padel centres in the UK to deliver this and making entry free, clearly made the event attractive.”

It was two days of groundbreaking student padel for men’s, Women’s and Mixed events in the largest student padel tournament to date. On the Saturday evening in front of a packed crowd enjoying the free food and drinks party laid on by UK PADEL, Cardiff Met University were triumphant against Bristol University.

Men’s Winners: Nottingham University

Men’s RU: Exeter

Women’s Winners: Cardiff

Women’s RU: Plymouth

Another hook of the tournament was to be as inclusive as possible and deal with a likely difference in standards across the event as an open competition, so the UK PADEL team had devised a new format for the event.   Mark Ayers added “We broke down a typical group and knockout scoring format for this event, delivering it as timed 30-minute matches. Teams and pairs still know what they have to do to win, and the whole thing starts and finishes on time, people can clearly organise and prepare for each match and throughout the weekend and there’s a smaller chance of a missed flight at the end of it. Particularly for national tournaments, people have to organise their travel and if you are at the whim of how long the previous match took you don’t know when you are leaving.”

Padel is among the fastest-growing racket sports on the planet but is only really getting started in the UK and needs to connect with audiences in the right way. Fast and furious worked for the student teams, everyone knew what was going on no hanging around. This was student sport at its best. The players created a super buzz, very friendly, collegiate, they were all polite and respectful to each other, curious and engaged and on time and immersed in the padel action

What is next for UK PADEL events?

“ Well on the team front it’s straight into our first Four Nations master series at Slazenger Padel Leeds in March and then onto the return of the UK PADEL Over 50 County Championships in April” says Mark Ayers. “We also have the UK PADEL Schools U15 championships at the start of March in London. It’s going to be a big year for UK PADEL helping to get children active through Padel, in November we’ll have the UK Padel Junior County Championships and throughout the year we have a number of school events including the UK Padel Schools U15 and U18 Championships in March and October respectively.”

What does the future look like for padel events?  “We hope this event will have a lasting legacy on the impact of padel in the UK as we are working with the LTA and BUCS to get Padel recognised under BUCS and that will be hugely beneficial to the sport” says Nick Baker. “Wherever we hold it will be far away from someone. If BUCS come on board hopeful that can unlock funding. We believe it’s got a lot of the qualities to be one of the best sports to engage as wide a range of people as possible”

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