Lake Travis area youth attended LTTA's Youth Racquet Sports Play Day on Sunday at Lake Travis Padel. The event provided a fun way to promote racquet sports as a healthy lifestyle.
Lake Travis Padel, located on a serene ranch in Spicewood, features a pro shop, tennis court and two new, state-of-the-art padel courts.
While most of the kids had some previous experience playing tennis, many of them had never tried the sport of padel, a cross between tennis and squash. Padel is played on turf courts, a third the size of a tennis court, which is enclosed by walls of glass and metallic mesh. Like squash, balls can be played off the walls. Lower compression tennis balls are used and scoring is the exact same as tennis.
Youth Racquet Sport Play Day participants were able to experience on-court games and skill clinics delivered by both tennis and padel coaches.
While Lake Travis Tennis Association focuses primarily on tennis, they see the benefit to providing a variety of racquet sport opportunities. "Putting any kind of racquet into the hands of kids is a great way to motivate them to get outside and be active,” said Richard Evans, president of LTTA. "We feel that there is plenty of room for cross-over between the various racquet sports."
Evans referenced an extensive 25-year observational study which recently confirmed that racquet sports can increase life expectancy by almost 10 years. “The findings are very encouraging,” said Evans. "LTTA will continue to develop a variety of programming that will motivate kids to get outside and play."
For more information on LTTA programs, visit the Events page. For photos from the event, please see the gallery below.