A career woman’s padel life in Sweden.

In this article, we take a look at the lifestyle of Jana, a career woman from Slovenia who enjoys her padel in Sweden, the second largest padel country after Spain.

A tall, stylish, and lovely woman with a look that could have come out of a magazine walked into the café where we were meeting – overlooking Lake Vätter, Sweden’s second largest lake.

Jana.

On Friday evening, I set up an interview with her after work. I expected her to come in her usual career-woman style business attire, but she showed up in a casual look of a gingham check shirt and jeans.

She left work 40 minutes before the interview, dashed home, prepared dinner for her two sons, ages 13 and 10, in just about 30 minutes, and asked me to follow her for the interview. She began the interview in a calm and relaxed atmosphere that gave no hint of her busy schedule. She was indeed giving a professional impression with a good sense of transitions between different worlds.

Jana, a Slovenian who has lived in Sweden for 11 years. 40 years old plus. She moved to Sweden 11 years ago with her oldest son, who was one and a half years old at the time. This due to that her husband, Uros, was playing professional soccer for the Swedish team Jönköping Södra at the time. As the wife of an athlete, she had no hesitation in making the move.

In the beginning, she spent her days attending Swedish language school while raising her children on parental leave. Jana did not have many friends at the time, and her life in Sweden, which was unfamiliar to her, was very isolated. When her second son turned 2 years old, she got a job at a swedish company. She then progressed steadily in her career and it wasn’t long before she was put in charge of the department that she took on.

After about five years on the job, he wanted a new environment and changed jobs, working for three years at another company as an operations manager, but admit it was difficult to balance work and family time, leaving home at 6:30 a.m. and returning to home at 8:30 p.m. every day.

How she met Padel

Jana was leading such a busy life, but in 2020, she met Padel. Corona (

Covid-19) shortly before it struck in Sweden.

Her husband, Uros, would go to play padel with his friends at least once a week. Jana had no idea what the sport was all about, and when Uros told her he was going to play, she simply said, “Go ahead,” and sent him on his way, not even the slightest bit interested in joining.

However, she suddenly wondered one day, “What is a padel?

She immediately asked Uros what kind of sport is padel, and he replied, Wao!

Jana had never played a ball sport before, but she was intrigued by the movement of the ball, wondering how it would bounce around on the walled court.

After hearing about the sport from Uros, Jana decided that she wanted to experience padel immediately and decided to try it out with Uros. Acting as soon as the idea comes to mind is an essential action for those who are always looking forward to evolve, she thought.

It is also interesting to note how good he was at communicating the joy of the sport as a soccer player.

Her eyes lit up when she talked about this time during the interview.

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The day Jana and her husband visited a padel court for the first time.

First, she watched her husband and his friends play, and she enjoyed watching the ball bounce off the wall and then hit back again, smash out and the ball go out of the court, and just how much fun the ball was having, she expressed with a smile.

Then Jana grabbed a Padel racquet for the first time and went on the court. And she immediately fell in love.

On the first day, her husband Uros, who has a good feel for the ball in soccer, wondered why she could not tell which way the ball was bouncing, but she continued to practice and now she can defenitely pick up a ball that hits the back wall.

Jana still recalls with a twinkle in her eye the excitement of the first day she played padel, when she had no idea what a ball felt like, but really enjoyed every pitch.

Then, for a while, the couple booked a court for just the two of them to practice with Uros.

Jana told me how her husband took her by the hand and taught her what was going on at that time. He was really patient, she said.

Gradually, he began to enjoy mixing (male/ female pairs) with a couple of his friends and neighborhood friends from old times.

The year 2020 was the height of the Swedish padel boom, and ironically, padel was peaking during the pandemic in Europe. There were so many people playing padel, also including TV commercials featuring padel, that it was even difficult to find an available padel court to book. At the same time it made it very easy to find opponents.

After a year and a half of enjoying padel with her friends, she began to feel that padel, “which was only for fun”, was not enough.

She wanted to get better and improve. Jana’s further passion for padel therefore fueled.

Jana decided to book her first lesson in the beginner’s class. It was about a year and a half after her husband had taught her padel from scratch and she had started to enjoy it.

Whenever I do something, I always give it 110 percent.

She gave 110% at her career – and 110% when she was at the padel court. But she was frustrated with herself for not being able to improve more in padel. So she gradually increased the number of classes she could fit into her schedule. paddel – in order to hopefully one day reach the next stage.

Padel give me important friends

In the process, Jana, decided that it wasn’t enough and wanted to participate in competitions and events, so she applied for her first Americano (individually) by herself. She entered the Americano by herself and met two friends who would later become her best padel buddies.

The three women who attended alone quickly became friends and began to regularly play padel together.

Jana surely met her like-minded friends at the right time. “Whatever we do, by following our passions and walking step by step towards our goals with a straight heart, we will meet the people we are meant to meet who have the same goals as us”.

Playing with others who share her passion for padel has further improved her level and ambition for padel.

She gradually gained confidence as she began to beat other teams in the neighborhood, who had originally been good at padel. Incidentally, some of the other teams stopped accepting Jana’s invitations the day they lost to her and her husband, she remarked jokingly with a triumphant smile.

She says that she still keeps friends with the moms she first played with, although they are no longer on the same level and don’t play together as much anymore.

Padel trips with padel friends

The friends she made at her first Americano, which she attended alone, began to meet outside of padel. The next step for the group naturally became padel trips to various of locations in Sweden, as well as to the padel country number one – Spain.

The girls for instance enjoyed two domestic weekends with padel & SPA and two trips to Alicante and Barcelona during 2022. They also enjoyed a 4-day padel trip to Croatia in May this year. “When we go on trips, the four of us divide our roles and responsorbilities. One is In charge of plane tickets, one is in charge of hotels, the third is in charge of coaches and the forth is in charge of leisure activities”. says Jana proudly

Looking back at the photos from the trips, Jana explain about happy memories. I guess its a good oportunity in padel to build new networks by always being true to our intuition and taking action, just like Jana.

My priorities are family, padel and work.

“I was busy with work, so although I did padel regularly, it was only about twice a week”.

Her 2022 was full of family, work, and padel. But one day, Jana paused when her second son told her that she had no time for her son at all.

She realized she was so busy with work that she had to cut back on both padel time and parenting time.

Realizing her sons child’s feelings, Jana changed her job in December 2022 to a position closer to home, allowing more time for Padel and more time with her children.

I myself don’t like to say “usually,” but you might think that the normal, common solution here would be to refrain from padel because you don’t have much time with your children, but that’s not what Jana had in mind, and credit to her for changing her job to prioritize her padel and her children.

Wasn’t there any thoughts about reducing the time that she spent on padel?

No, no, no, no, she responded immediately.

“Padel really gives me so much. Mentally and physically. And most of all, I have made so many new friends since I started to play. So I made the choice to change my job rather than spend less time with padel”, she says with a serious look in her eyes.

I always want to be in good shape for myself.

Through Padel she is learning about life.

Of course we are happy when we win, of course we are frustrated when we lose without being sad when we lose, but we train ourselves to feel that way, to reflect on what we can do to become even better, and to look forward and not be discouraged. Through PADEL, we can also grow as human beings. When Jana talks about her own padel life, she can also see her own growth, and she once again reflects on the changes in herself as something very positive.

There is no end to learning. Through PADEL, I realized that there is no end to learning.

She basically enjoys padel and have decided that she doesn’t want to deal with the hassle of relationships that can come with changing padel partners. However, she has tried a few league matches, but decided it’s not for her. There are plenty of tournaments and other type of events that can fulfil her need to compete.

It seems that she usually enjoys her padel more by fighting with herself rather than worrying about winning or losing.

Padel really gives me so much. Mentally and physically. And most of all, I have made so many friends since I started Padel.

Padel, Slovenia

First padel court in Slovenia was built in 2022. And it continues, with the opening of 2 courts only 3 minutes away from her parents’ house.

She says that she is still a newcomer to padel. But in Slovenia – as there are still very few girls playing – she feels like a senior within the sport. This also mean that it is not impossible for her to become a representative of the Slovenian women’s team.

By the way, when I asked her if she ever dreamed of representing the Slovenian team, she smiled and said that if she were 20 years old and still single, she would have set her sights on it.

Padel as mental care

It seems to be a way of mental care for her, as she says that while she is stressed at work, the time spent playing padel makes her forget all the stress and the bad things of her daily life.

What is the goal of Jana’s padel?

“To be on top of the world”, she answers and laughed, “That’s a lie, I started padel too late, so I can’t have that dream, she continued. My goal was to beat my husband. But I’ve already done that. I’ve already accomplished that, 3-0. She said triumphantly.

“So my next goal is for my husbands friens to invite me to play with them. And for them to invite me because they think Im a good player. And ofcourse for them to see that I am a better player than my husband hehe”.

For some reason, I felt very refreshed by this answer, which was typical of a career woman living in Sweden, a country where women are strong and resilient.

It won’t be long before Jana will surpass the level of her husband’s Padel, who taught her the charms of Padel.

Do you have any connection with Japan?

“To be honest, my relationship with Japan is when I first met you (the author). If I may say so, I learned a little about the japanese business culture when I studied global marketing in college.

I have never actually experienced it, just studied it, but what impressed me about the Japanese business culture was the eye-to-eye contact, handing business cards, not mixing public and private matters in business, not showing too much emotion in business, etc. It was very interesting compared to my own culture”..

Finally, I asked Jana a common question, “Would you like to visit Japan? She raised the key of her voice one tone and said, “Of course! I’d love to go to Tokyo and see that wonderful city! She answered with a smile.

When you see Jana in her tall blonde figure at the Japanese padelcourt, everyone, please tell her that you read the article in Padelish.

Jana, who had never played any sports before, encountered a new sport in a foreign country, faced the sport, continued her personal growth, met friends who enjoyed the same sport, and built up a good time.

It’s really interesting how Padel can attract so many people who have never particularly played sports before.

Please continue to read our next article about Padel and its world-class lifestyle that captivates people all over the world.