Milton Keynes: The Countdown to Opening Day Starts Now
All of a sudden, our newest club venue is taking shape! This week we’re sharing a first look at groundworks from Willen Lake, home to UK PADEL Milton Keynes, our fourth Buckinghamshire venue. It’s bringing four covered, all-weather courts and two open-air courts to a city of more than 300,000 people. The build is now moving rapidly, and we can reveal the club opens its doors on 17th October.
Before that, mark next Friday (18th September) clearly in your diary. That’s when we open the full programme of activities and membership options, so you can plan your first sessions and lock in early access before launch day.
In the weeks ahead there will be another way to follow the build-up too. Faye Cornhill, a UK PADEL ambassador, will be documenting her journey from complete beginner to Milton Keynes club regular on Instagram. Faye juggles a busy life: two kids, a school run, and a full-time job. We think you’re going to see a lot of yourself in her story.
Over 60 County Cup: Winners Crowned in Bristol
The first event under the new Padel County Cup banner proved an enormous success with East Scotland (Mixed), Yorkshire (Women’s) and Surrey (Men’s) securing the three top-tier Over 60 titles in Bristol. There was huge excitement with both the Men’s and Women’s finals requiring championship shootouts to crown a winner. Mark Ayers, UK PADEL Director of Events, said: “The standard is noticeably improving year on year. Players care about representing their counties and there is genuine competition on court.” We generated nearly 15,000 views of the live stream across the weekend and 200,000 social views in all of the coverage, including highlights and interviews.
Relaunched Masters Series Begins Next Month
The (very) recently relaunched UK PADEL Masters Series is welcoming interest from sponsors. Played in five categories – Open, O40, O50, O60 and, for the first time, O70 – the Masters Series will straddle five events from Wales to Portugal between October 2026 and March 2027. The appetite is clearly there for over-age category for padel, as evidenced by our previous item. There is a fast-growing market for competitive padel well beyond the sport’s traditional younger age groups. The series opens in Swansea on 10th-11th October, and entry is open to all players. You don’t need to have played the Masters before, or represented your county, to take part.
Quartet win Lateral voucher
Thanks to Lateral, one of our partners for the Over 60 Padel County Cup, for celebrating players who have no intention of stopping. The four players involved in this brilliant winning rally from the County Cup’s won The Lateral Rally of the Tournament – and each receive a £50 voucher to spend at more than 100 retailers. Well done to Jan Mort and Elaine Lowe from Lancashire and their opponents Rachel Angel and Jess White (Surrey) for inspiring us with this superbly watchable point, sealed with a fine winner, during the group stages last weekend. Lateral provides modern health insurance for active over 60s.
Padel Returns to Roland Garros
Padel is taking over one of tennis’s most iconic venues this week, with the Paris Major turning the clay courts of Roland Garros into one of Premier Padel’s biggest events of the year. After the 2025 edition drew 62,128 spectators across the week, including 27,000 over finals weekend alone (making it bigger than Madrid’s P1 event and close to the Barcelona Masters), all eyes will be on whether those numbers can be beaten this year. With more than one million euros in prize money on offer and the finals set for Sunday, this promises to be another landmark moment charting the global rise of padel.
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