Teen Padel prodigy in Spain

At just 16, Cape Town-born Padel player Max Bendel is making huge waves on the international Padel circuit, having achieved a double title win in the Under-16 and Under-18 categories at the FIP Promises Tour in Fourways in December 2025. 

Bendel took a leap of faith in the sport that few athletes his age would dare to make, literally leaving home, school, and family in South Africa to focus on Padel training full-time in Alicante, southeastern Spain, where he has been based since March 2024. 

Bendel is training full-time at the Juan Carlos Ferrero Tennis and Padel Academy, one of Europe’s most respected high-performance training centres. “It’s quite a famous academy,” he says. “You can really feel the level here.” 

His days, he told the SA Jewish Report this week, are intense and highly structured. “I start at 09:15 and finish the first session at around 13:00,” Bendel said. “Then I eat, shower, relax a bit, and train again from about 15:00 until 17:30.” 

In total, he trains up to six hours a day. “It’s Padel and gym,” he says. “Padel and fitness training, every day.” Alongside his training, Bendel does school online. “I’m doing the Cambridge IGCSE [the International General Certificate of Secondary Education]. I’ve got a teacher who checks up on me and helps if I need anything.” 

Bendel started playing Padel only in March 2023, when a family friend gave him a Padel racket as a gift. “At the time, I didn’t really know what the sport was,” he said. 

But sport has always been a part of him. “I’ve been playing sport my whole life. From when I was three or four years old, my dad used to throw a tennis ball at me and I’d play cricket. From about three years old, I was playing cricket seriously. I also played soccer at school and at club level. Cricket was the priority – I was always active and competing.” 

As he grew older, tennis entered the mix, and for a time, Bendel juggled all three sports. “I was playing cricket, soccer, tennis – everything,” he said. “But then Padel came into my life.” 

What began casually soon turned into something more serious. “At first, I was playing maybe once a week, if that. Then slowly, I started building up. I played more, trained more, and started playing with higher-level guys.” 

While still attending Herzlia High School in Cape Town, Bendel’s commitment intensified. “I was playing intense matches three or four times a week while still at school. That’s when I realised this could actually become something.” 

His first formal coaching came under Chevaan Davids. “He was my first coach,” Bendel said. “That was really where things started becoming more structured.” 

At the end of 2023, his father asked him if he wanted to go to Spain for two weeks. “The idea was to go to two different Padel academies and see what it was like, what the sport was like there, and what coaches in Europe had to say,” Bendel said. 

The experience proved pivotal. “After that December trip, the academy I’m at now got back to us and said it would be great if I could come back in March 2024,” he says. “That’s when everything changed.” 

Living alone in Spain with his family in Cape Town hasn’t been easy, Bendel said. “My family is still back home, and I’m here on my own. My family are supportive and were super keen for me to come here and try.” 

That support, and the leap of faith has clearly delivered remarkable results. In 2023, Bendel competed in the FIP Promises Tour, an international junior Padel circuit for players aged under 12 to under 18. “South Africa started hosting the tournaments last year,” Bendel said. “It hosted three, and the last one was in December.” 

Bendel entered two age categories. “Because I was under 16, I played Under-16 and Under-18.” He won all three tournaments in both age groups. “I won six tournaments – six out of six,” he said, incredulous. 

Padel, unlike tennis, is strictly a doubles sport, making the achievement even more impressive. “For the Under-16 tournament, I didn’t even know my partner,” Bendel said. “I met him when I arrived at the tournament.” 

Bendel is doing Grade 11 through Cambridge online, and has lessons every day. “I try do it in most of the breaks I get and after dinner. I try to do the best I can in school with the amount that I can do. If Padel doesn’t work out as my career, I would want to be in the business world and do entrepreneurial stuff.” 

Despite his rapid sporting success, Bendel remains grounded. “My Padel career hasn’t been long, but it’s been good,” he said. But he’s realistic about the journey ahead. “I just took it to the next level really quickly. Now it’s about training hard and trusting the process.” 

With elite European training, a strong support system, and early international success behind him, Bendel’s trajectory is one to watch closely. As he puts it, “If you train hard, the results come.”