Marta Marrero to Padel Alto: ”Lucia and I focus on the World Padel Tour”

Marta Marrero and Lucia Sainz have had a difficult start to the season. In an exclusive interview with Padel Alto, Marta Marrero talks about her injury, the equality of prize money, and the women's decision about which circuit they will play. 

Padel Alto: It's been a tough start of the season. Tell me more about it. 

— Yes, it has been an atypical preseason. In the beginning, Lucia had to recover from a foot problem. I had a very good preseason until the week before Miami, when I got injured. I had a muscle strain that affected us at the end of the preseason.

Padel Alto: Did it affect you in Reus? You didn't arrive as you wanted from the physical point of view, did you?

— Without a doubt. I arrived very weakly physically in Reus, and we paid for it. Now we are better, physically recovered, and we are finding our level step by step. We are improving day by day to find our best version, and we are very confident that we will find it soon. The training intensity is getting higher, and we are responding well. We will face the tournament in Vigo with the greatest possible enthusiasm, knowing that the level will be high from the first round and we will have to give everything we have to win the matches.

”Women's padel is evolving year after year”

Marta Marrero also refers to the level of the young upcoming players and how this means that the established players also have to improve their game. 

— Women's padel has been growing for several years, and it's developing faster and faster. The young players are better prepared physically, faster, and with a very polished technique. You can see that padel is becoming more professional, we all train the same hours and demand the maximum from ourselves. Women's padel is becoming better. 

Ahead of the Reus Open, the World Padel Tour made a long-awaited announcement when it decided to introduce equal prize money between men and women on the tour. Marta Marrero sees an optimistic future for women's padel.

— It's a good time for this to happen, women's padel is evolving year after year, and the World Padel Tour knows it. For years now, women's padel has been putting on a great show and filling the stands just like the boys’. I think it's great news for all the players who want to be professionals, who nowadays have to work in something else to keep up with the costs of the professional circuit. It's a very important step on the road to equality in women's padel, and I think it's a triumph for the players who have been working for years for this moment to come.

”Focus on WPT”

The new Premier Padel tour starts in just over a week. But without a women's category. 

— Lucia and I decided to focus on what we have today, playing in WPT. We have a contract with them, and we have to respect it and not lose focus of our objective. 

Marta sees the creation of the IPPA, the new association on the women´s side, as something necessary and believes that they can achieve many more goals together.

— The creation of the association was something very positive, something necessary. Coming from tennis, I know that all sports should have their own players' association to defend their rights. The union among the players has made this possible, and it has also made it possible to achieve important things such as obtaining equal prizes in WPT. I think it's very positive and another sign of the professionalization that padel is going through.