Beach tennis on Rio beach wins fans all year round – 04/04/2023 – Sport

The stretch of Copacabana beach at Rua Figueiredo de Magalhães, in Rio de Janeiro, was occupied by a group of friends, with live music, barbecue and a frenetic coming and going of balls in the air. It was a meeting of beach tennis practitioners, a sport that took over the beaches of the Brazilian coast.

The sport, a beach variation of conventional tennis, gains more fans each summer and should extend to the other seasons of the year. In a good part of the city’s waterfront, from Flamengo beach to Barra da Tijuca, there are sports courts and schools.

In Rio, the modality is no longer relegated to a corner in the sand. According to the Municipal Department of Sports, today there are 80 beach tennis courts on the city’s beaches, more than footvolleyball courts (70) and beach volleyball courts (48). Schools multiplied.

Those who practice it say that the biggest gain is in social life. “Beach tennis adds two very important things: sport and sociability. It even takes away the desire to consume alcohol”, says Paulo César Aguiar Gomes, 64, a civil servant who discovered the modality when he returned to Rio de Janeiro, in 2016, after a season living in Goiânia.

“I came to live in Copacabana, spent a day here and thought about doing a beach sport. It was the time of the Olympic Games. Today, in addition to beach tennis, I practice bodybuilding to withstand the younger group in matches. Before, I only practiced beer “, he jokes.

Created in Italy and seen on the coast of Brazil since 2008, beach tennis is a kind of competitive version of frescobol, a modality created on the beaches of Rio in which two people use a wooden racket to hit the ball, without letting it go. to fall.

Because there is no counting of points, there are no winners and losers in racquetball. The writer and journalist Millôr Fernandes, who died in 2012, attributed to himself the invention of the sport, practiced since the 1960s and still traditional on the beaches.

But beach tennis gained fame and publicity. Today, there are national circuits for those who play competitively, championships broadcast on the internet and on television and courts located far from the coast, as in the region of Avenida Faria Lima, in São Paulo.

It’s not a cheap sport. The rackets, made of fiberglass or carbon, cost no less than R$300, in a version for beginners. The most professional pieces exceed R$ 1,000. In the schools, the monthly plans cost around R$ 250 and can be more expensive depending on the neighborhood.

The game is divided by points, games and sets, in a count similar to that of conventional tennis. The sporting spirit, in which everyone participates and leaves happy, comes from the old racquetball.

“I already played tennis, and some friends migrated to beach tennis. I decided to check it out and realized that it was a more pleasant environment. The social circle that we create is very important here”, says administrator Hugo Miada, 39, who practices the modality eight years ago, on Ipanema beach.

Mixed duos, formed by men and women of different ages, are not only allowed but encouraged.

Architect Vânia Jacobina, 52, discovered the sport five years ago, became a substitute teacher at a small school to avoid students leaving and today organizes events and competitions at Atytude Beach Tennis, in Copacabana, where, on some weekends, practitioners gather for a barbecue and a “play” —equivalent to pelada, a game without commitment, in the language of football.

“You want to win, but root for the other. The beautiful thing is to see all ages and bodies. You can be chubby, short, skinny, you can start late and, even so, you will be encouraged to stay and get along”, praises the architect.

For GAE (Grupo Ação Ecológica), the increase in beach tennis courts has generated an urban problem. “It’s a total mischaracterization of the city’s landscape”, says lawyer Rogério Zouein, director of the group, who intends to file a complaint with the Rio Public Prosecutor’s Office so that the city government can formulate a plan for the use and management of the beach.

“The sand is an area of ​​permanent preservation, and the organic law of the municipality says that the landscape is the greatest asset. But the beach today is neglected by the public authorities. People put up as many nets as they want. A sad spectacle of how not to treat yourself the beach in Rio de Janeiro. We thought about the possibility of the Public Prosecutor’s Office demanding from the city hall an effective use order”, adds Zouein.

The practice of beach tennis was regularized by the city hall in 2021, which ensured the use of predetermined spaces and defined established days and times for training.

Bank employee Julieta Lima, 47, bought rackets and balls, sports sunglasses and started waking up before 6 am, at least three times a week, to take beach tennis lessons in Barra da Tijuca. “I’ve been there for two months, I started in the summer and I’m not going to stop. I’m even coming in the winter. It was the best investment I’ve made in my health.”