With more and more padel tournaments and events starting to pop up around the U.S., I’m rarely surprised to hear about a new one. But that all changed during a recent call with Steve Long and Bianca Vanrell, who run the North American padel firm Off The Wall Consulting and are getting ready to launch an all-female, U.S. (and Latin American) padel tour known as the FEMME Open in Houston next month.
Unbeknownst to me prior to our conversation, while the FEMME Open may be new on this side of the Atlantic, it has actually already established itself as the world’s premier amateur racket sports event for women since first being launched five years ago in Sweden by co-founders Johanna Livijin and Johanna Aybar.
And now Long and Vanrell are helping the venture to take a big step forward by assisting in launching a FEMME Open padel and pickleball tour where amateur women players in the U.S. and Latin America will be paired based on intermediate-to-advanced rankings and compete for the prestigious title.
The first stop is set for TEMPO Padel & Pickleball Club in Houston (which we featured in a recent article) on December 6 – 7. In addition to a padel and pickleball tournament, there will also be numerous social and networking activities across the inaugural two day event.
While the FEMME Open only started in 2018 with a single tournament in Sweden, it has now grown into Europe’s largest women’s padel tournament and Sweden’s largest women’s network for padel, tennis, golf, health, and lifestyle — and according to the founders, “is a concept that engages women and players of all levels, from beginners to professionals.”
Today there are over 10,000 women in the FEMME Open network in Europe and its receives roughly an additional 800,000 impressions per quarter via various social media platforms.
Yet despite all the success that this unique concept has already enjoyed, the biggest — and most exciting — growth looks like it is still yet to come. In fact, in addition to the U.S., the FEMME Open already hosts events outside Europe in Australia, New Zealand, and Malaysia — and will soon be expanding to Mexico, Colombia, Indonesia, France, the UAE/Dubai, Chile, and South Africa.
What’s more, as you can see in the graphics above, the FEMME Open has grown from just one tournament and 36 participants in 2018 to a projected 100+ tournaments with thousands of female participants by the end of 2024. And between 2024 and 2026, with the help of Long and Vanrell, they plan to host tournaments in leading U.S. padel destinations including Austin, Denver, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Miami, Nashville, New York, Orlando, and San Diego.
As Vanrell told me in our recent conversation, the FEMME Open is truly a passion project for her, adding in a follow-up email, “To the women with strength, grace and dedication, the Femme Open USA welcomes you! Join us for an exclusive first of its kind Padel and Pickleball tourn-event, celebrating women in sport.”
For further information, please visit the offical FEMME Open site or contact Vanrell directly for early registration and/or sponsorship inquiries.
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