Analysis of the finalists smashes in professional padel

Abstract

The aim was to analyze the characteristics of the finalist smashes, through the validated OASP instrument, according to their effectiveness in professional padel and according to the gender of the players. For this, 806 finalist smashes of 42 men's and 29 women's matches corresponding to six World Padel Tour tournaments of the 2021 season were analyzed, carrying out a descriptive and inferential analysis. The results indicate that, although men paly more winning smashes than women (men: 60.52%; women: 39.48%), both men and women play more winning smashes than errors smashes (men (winners: 76.66%, errors 23.34%); women (winners: 63.20%, errors: 36.8%)), decreasing their effectiveness as they move away from the net (end zones, men and error: RTC=5.0, RTC=3.7; end zones, women and error: RTC=6.5, RTC= 4.1; zones near the net, men and winner: RTC= 2.1, RTC=2.3, zones near the net, women and winner: RTC=5.3, RTC=4.2). In addition, men and women finish smashes successfully when they are flat (and topspin for men) and parallel, while they tend to finish with errors when they are sliced and crossed. Thus, padel training should take into account the characteristics of the smashes that players develop according to their gender, in order to improve the needs of the competition during training.