SMASH 2026's full schedule at AB Show just went live. Here's what's new, who's already on the floor, and why this could be the most important event for anyone building in padel before 2027.

The Wall Street Journal just covered padel's U.S. boom. What they didn't report: the country has exactly two people certified to coach the sport at the elite level, and that gap is going to decide who survives the next three years.

A low-budget campaign beat a 90-year competitor by asking one sharper question. Here's what it means for every racquet sports club, brand, and manufacturer trying to win on more than product.

That 365-day chart is the picture worth keeping. Look at it: flat line for nine months, then starting in April — nine spikes in ten weeks, each one an issue, and the peaks getting taller. 720 subscribers, 34,000 impressions, 4,000 article views, all of it built since spring. That is not a viral moment. That is a compounding asset. And here is the pattern inside the spikes worth noticing: Issues 08 and 09 are your two tallest peaks, back to back. The newsletter is not plateaui

Tennis, pickleball, and padel are not converging because the industry is enlightened. They are being forced together by economics — and fighting it the whole way. Here is the mid-year conclusion nobody else is publishing.

The 2026 Global Padel Report classifies the U.S. as a Diamond in the Rough — early-stage, fragmented, and highly price sensitive. Here's what that actually means if you're building something in this market, from someone who was in the room in Barcelona when the report dropped.

The operators who win the next five years in racquet sports aren't thinking about courts. They're thinking about decisions — which sport to add, when to move, and what to stop doing.

Racquet sports compensation data just got its first independent benchmark. Here's what the ARA's 2025 report reveals about director pay, club size, and where the gaps still exist.

The 2026 global racquet sports participation data is out. Here's what it actually means for tennis, padel, and pickleball operators, investors, and brands navigating the U.S. market right now.

The International Padel Cluster just named its first U.S. International Development Partner. Here's why that matters — and what it means for American companies serious about where padel is headed.

The International Padel Cluster has appointed Mike Knowles of Inside the Lines Advisory as U.S. International Development Partner — one of the first two partners appointed globally.

Anthropic interviewed over 80,000 people across 159 countries about what they want from AI — and what they fear. HR leaders are citing it. Educators are citing it. Nobody in racquet sports has touched it. Here's what it means for the decisions you're making right now.

Most pickleball operators are over-built on courts and under-built on brand. The operators who win the next five years will treat pickleball facility marketing as seriously as they treat site selection and construction.

A great Thursday night social is one of the most powerful tools a racquet sports club has. But events alone aren't a racquet sports club marketing strategy. Here's what most clubs get wrong — and what the best ones do differently.

I went to RacquetX 2026 with a thesis. The floor confirmed it. Here's what five thousand people and three days taught me about the real problem in racquet sports right now.

Racquet sports participation is up. Membership isn't following. Here's why most facilities have a demand strategy problem — not a marketing problem.**

Scaling a challenger brand inside a commodity category isn’t about making more noise. It’s about protecting differentiation while expanding reach. Here’s how disciplined positioning and integrated execution drove +15% dollar growth on the most profitable product line in the portfolio — without sacrificing margin.

Most strategies don’t fail in the room where they’re created. They fail under execution pressure — when priorities collide, resources tighten, and accountability is tested.

Rebranding is never just a marketing exercise—especially when the organization has nearly a century of history and a membership base that cares deeply about how things have always been done. That was the situation at the Racquet Sports Professionals Association (RSPA) when we undertook a full enterprise rebrand from the USPTA to the RSPA—one of the most important transitions the organization had faced in decades.

There’s a moment every organization hits where the problem isn’t strategy — it’s infrastructure. That was the case at the Racquet Sports Professionals Association (RSPA) when I took a hard look at two foundational systems that touched nearly every member and prospect: the website and the Career Center. Both were critical. Both were underperforming. And neither had meaningful budget behind them.