It was a weekend of achievements at home and abroad for British padel players in Exeter, Lithuania and Hong Kong.
GB stars took home the men’s and women’s titles at the LTA Grade 1 R3 Bullpadel Cup at City Padel Exeter in Devon.
Top seeds Abigail Tordoff and her Spanish partner Ainhoa Rico claimed their second LTA Grade 1 title of 2026, while in the men’s draw, Brits Alfonso Patacho and Chris Salisbury won the men’s title by overcoming higher seeds.
Top seeds Tordoff and Rico, who were crowned champions at the LTA Grade 1 Stratford event earlier this month, dropped just two games en route to the final.
In the championship match, they faced an all-British pairing of Alice Keddie and Victoria Nicholas. It proved to be a high-quality contest, lasting two and a half hours, with the top seeds overcoming the third seeds to win the title 7-5, 6-7, 6-2.
Tordoff said: “We are really happy to have won this event and the second R3 Bullpadel Cup Grade 1 in a row. We had a really tough match in the final but we are super pleased to come out with the victory in the end. It’s been such an enjoyable weekend with a brilliantly organised event and a lovely venue.”
On the men’s side, fourth seeds and LTA Padel National Championships runners-up Patacho and Salisbury had an impressive tournament to claim their first title of 2026.
The pair produced a major upset in the semi-finals, overcoming the second seeds, German Rodriguez Quesada and Manuel Valcarcel Sanchez of Spain.
They carried that momentum into the final, where they claimed a 6-4, 6-3 victory over the third seeded British-Spanish pair of Rio Hanif and Josep Aymerich Bellmunt.
Salisbury reflected: “We’re delighted to have won the event. The level throughout the tournament was really high, so we had to stay sharp in every match but we’re really pleased with how we handled it.”
The competition at City Padel Exeter was the second of seven LTA Grade 1 events in 2026 to take place across England, Scotland, and the Channel Islands as part of the British Tour, which encompasses the top padel competitions in Great Britain.
On the FIP Tour, there was further British success, with three players reaching finals across different events.
Alex Loughlan and Louis Harris had a positive week at the FIP Bronze Litas Kaunas, advancing to the final before narrowly missing out in a closely contested 7-6, 7-5 defeat. Their strong performance in Lithuania sees both players climb to new career-high rankings of 292.
Catherine Rose also continued her excellent form, partnering Spain’s Carmen Azcoitia Mazo to reach the final of the FIP Bronze Hong Kong.
There, they were defeated by the second-seeded Spanish duo, Cristina Carrascosa Cazorla and Patricia Araus Lopez 6-3, 6-1.
