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Hanna Maddock is back in the GB women’s team for next week’s FIP Euro Padel Cup and has been preparing for Madrid by clocking up the air miles, grafting hard… and playing beach volleyball!

Lanzarote-based Hanna was injured for last year’s European Padel Championships in Sardinia, but has earned a recall to the Great Britain team for this year’s rebranded, expanded Euros in the Spanish capital by grinding out good performances in FIP Tour and domestic tournaments since the turn of the year.

GB women’s captains Libby Fletcher and Agustin Gomez Silingo have selected Hanna alongside established group Aimee Gibson, Catherine Rose, Tia Norton, Lisa Phillips and Abigail Tordoff, plus 15-year-old debutante Rosie Quirk and another newcomer in Laura Jackson.

The GB men’s and women’s teams head out to Madrid on Tuesday (8 July) for a couple of days’ training, bonding and acclimatising (it’s going to be very hot), before beginning their campaign in Phase 2 of the reformatted competition on Friday at Madrid’s Padel G24 indoor arena. Read our FIP Euro Padel Cup guide.

Hanna, who turns 26 in two weeks’ time, has pressed the accelerator on her competitive padel career since the turn of the year, playing in eight FIP tournaments since March.

“I’ve really tried to prove myself to the team and have played as many tournaments as possible in the build-up to get my ranking up,” Hanna told The Padel Paper.

“Raising my level and ranking is a constant motivation but getting into the GB team again is definitely a big factor, because representing your country and playing in the Europeans is the highlight of the year.

“Now I’m selected, I’m training even more because I want to prove that they made the right decision in selecting me!”

Hanna joined the rest of the GB players at a special training camp with the Dutch team in Holland last week before competing in the FIP Silver Utrecht where she and Alice Keddie lost a closely-fought round of 32 match against (ironically) her GB team-mate Lisa Phillips and Marta Barrera, one of Hanna’s regular training partners in Lanzarote!

“I’ve been travelling so much to loads of tournaments — I was basically on the road the whole month of May,” she reveals. “You’re travelling from one country to another, sleeping at people’s houses, hotels or Air BnBs, you don’t eat that well and you do get run down. But it’s worth it when you go into a huge tournament like the Euros feeling well prepared and match fit.”

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GB join the FIP Euro Padel Cup in its second phase, with the four big guns — Spain, Italy, Portugal and France — not joining the fray until an as-yet unscheduled third phase, called ‘The Final 8’, later in the year.

“I’m not so keen on this change of format,” Hanna says. “Previously, all the countries would be there together, you get to see all the nations play and we’d fight for our place over a long week. This time, it has been divided up, which I don’t like as much. We’re only playing over a weekend, which is quite sad, but we’ll see how it goes.”

Prior to her injury last year, Hanna competed in CrossFit, which she has now cut down to a coupe of sessions a week. She has, however, started playing beach volleyball at home in the Canary Islands, which she feels has complemented her padel and gym training.

“Beach volleyball really helps me with the mental side of padel,” she reveals. “Having another sport makes me enjoy padel even more and stops it from becoming too overwhelming, so I do that when I get time off the padel court.

“It also helps physically because it’s such a demanding sport. Running in the sand helps me get in better shape for my padel too.”

Good luck to Hanna and both British teams in Madrid at the FIP Euro Padel Cup!

You can watch live coverage from eight courts at the indoor Padel G24 in Madrid on the FIP YouTube channel, results and draws on the FIP website as well as our in-depth coverage on The Padel Paper.

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She celebrated the victory of the championship (the second in two years) with Ekipe Orizzonte of Catania as a protagonist. And in the last few days, Chiara Tabani returned to the city for a few days: the thirty-year-old from Prato went to the pool in via Roma as part of the project promoted by Azzurra “Try water polo”, training very young boys and girls for a few hours. And in the last few hours, the former pillar of the Setterosa also met the water polo players of Azzurra in Follonica, fresh from the end of the championship. It was an opportunity to meet up (considering that Chiara, during her lightning returns to Prato over the years, had met and trained for a few days a good part of the group, ed.) to compare notes and train. After all, it’s not every day that you can train under the direction of an international-level athlete. A moment of relaxation, for Tabani, before starting to focus on the next competitive season. Before last year, Chiara had come very close to winning the Serie A1 water polo championship several times, without however realizing her dream: in Spain she had won everything in a single season, in 2016/17 when she was defending the colors of Sabadell (including the top Spanish division) but the top Italian tournament seemed like a pipe dream. The player who won the Olympic silver medal in Rio 2016 had therefore decided to accept the proposal of the Sicilian club two summers ago (leaving Roma, with whom she had won the Italian Cup in both 2019 and 2022) and since then she has always triumphed: she has made a decisive contribution, in terms of technique, dynamism and experience, in giving an extra edge to Ekipe Orizzonte. And while waiting for the competitions to resume, who knows, maybe she will find more time for another training session with the Azzurra athletes.

John Florentine

Athlete of the Year

Kenai Black, Bohemia Manor, Junior

Coach of the Year

Evan Cohn, Bohemia Manor

Jared Adams, Elkton, Senior

John Amoretti, Rising Sun, Senior

M.J. Brusio, Rising Sun, Senior

Coumel Edwards, Perryville, Junior

Jakob Edwards, Rising Sun, Senior

Brenden Hampton, Perryville, Sophomore

Niklas Haraldsson, Rising Sun, Senior

Khalil Jones, Bohemia Manor, Junior

Jonathan Kristovich, North East, Sophomore

Dain Lenz, Bohemia Manor, Senior

Brady Martin, Perryville, Senior

Landen Milloway, Rising Sun, Senior

Jacob Seiple, Bohemia Manor, Senior

Gage Stefanick, Rising Sun, Freshman

Sebastian Pagliaro, North East, Senior

Cameron Washington, Perryville, Junior

Jason Wolfenden, Bohemia Manor, Senior

Honorable Mentions

by Laura Garber

“It’s Halloween, plus volleyball, plus drinking,” Redondo Beach resident Alex Waxenbaum said in describing the 30th annual Smackfest Beach Volleyball tournament, held last Saturday at the Hermosa Beach pier. The tournament was presented by Smack Sportswear and Michelob Ultra, and featured over 170 coed teams.

According to Bill Sigler, the event’s organizer and long-time Hermosa Beach volleyball coach, the event is the largest coed 4’s tournament in the country. 

Divisions included pro and fun teams in costumes that included Playboy Bunnies, bananas and Italian chefs. 

Team Top Golf, featuring local volleyball stars Riley Norman and Travis Hannemann, claimed the pro division title and a $4,000 prize, defeating Mommies.

“It’s becoming a family event. The kids who won this year’s pro division are the children of the pro division winners 15 years ago,” said Sigler speaking about Kevin Norman and Chris Hannemann’s 2008 win. 

In the fun division, The Average Joes defeated Polynesian Punch, a team that included AVP legends Albert Hannemann and Brent Doble.

The 9th Annual Smacktoberfest will be held at Seaside Lagoon in Redondo Beach on either Saturday, Sep. 27; or Saturday, Oct. 11. It includes beer and wine concessions. Last year’s Smacktoberfest sold out in five minutes, Sigler said. ER

WAVERLY — Emma True ended her career as a national champion.

The former Brainerd Warrior and Wartburg College senior won the national title in the hammer throw at the NCAA Division III Outdoor National Championships with a throw of 59.21 meters.

True is the first hammer throw national champion in Wartburg history. She earned first-team All-American honors for the second time in her career.

True went into the national championships ranked third in the event.

“The weather was kind of icky throughout the week, so I was a little nervous that the weather wasn’t going to cooperate, but come the day of the competition, it ended up being fine,” True said. “It was my last meet with a lot of girls I’ve competed against since I was a sophomore. I was really excited.”

True had been building toward a national title since her freshman year. She competed for Brainerd in high school, but never reached the state tournament. When she went to Wartburg to start throwing the hammer things started to click.

“I have always dreamed of becoming a national champion,” True said. “Prior to this year, my highest place at a national meet was third. I knew it was possible, but I never really expected it. I was ecstatic.”

When True arrived on campus at Wartburg, throws coach Seth Roberson sparked the idea of her throwing the hammer.

“He requires every freshman to try out weight throw and hammer throw,” True said. “I just picked it up and practiced it and I happened to find a liking to it.”

Wartburg College

True owns the school records in both the hammer throw and the weight room at Wartburg College.

“I kind of joined the track team just to do it,” True said. “I enjoyed the sport. I didn’t really realize that I could become a national champion until my sophomore year. I started showing more distance and things clicked for me. I just worked as hard as I could to perfect my skill. But high school Emma had no idea that this would happen.”

True qualified for her first national championships in her sophomore year at Wartburg in the weight throw. She placed fifth to earn first-team All-American honors.

“It really pushed me to want to do better,” True said. “My junior year I threw my personal best of 59.88 meters and at the time that put me eighth all time for Division III.”

True is staying in Waverly, Iowa, to teach sixth grade special education. She graduated in the spring. She will also volunteer as a throws coach at Wartburg College.

The highlight for True during the national championships was to get a slow clap on her last throw of her career when she already had the national title in hand.

“I made a deal a couple of months ago with my coach, who hates slow clapping,” True said. “It’s a common thing to take place in field events, but he never lets up slow clap for events. I made a deal with him that if I were in the situation where I knew I was winning the national meet on my last throw he would initiate a slow clap. It was a really special moment where it really clicked in my head that I won a national meet.”

CONRAD ENGSTROM may be reached at 218-855-5861 or conrad.engstrom@brainerddispatch.com. Follow on Twitter at www.twitter.com/the_rad34.

Started at the Dispatch in June of 2019.

How things have changed for the Tippecanoe volleyball program over the years when it comes to their summer youth camp.

Coach Howard Garcia noted there was a time period where they celebrated 30 campers in the gym looking to improve their game during the summer. Now as the campers at the 2025 youth camp wrapped up for another year, over 70 future athletes from the community enjoyed the Red Devils camp.

“I like the attendance because we are getting kids in eighth grade down to third grade, so that means that volleyball is out there,” Garcia said. “It could have been much more, but you have kids who are playing AAU basketball or summer softball, but those kind of numbers means the program is in a good place.” Garcia and his coaching staff, along with the high school players, teach the youth different aspects of the game based on their grade level, which helps all of them progress in their game. “For the younger ones, it’s about the feeling of touching a volleyball and trying to do it correctly, even though sometimes they struggle with it because they don’t have the knowledge yet,” he said. “For the older kids, we try to teach them the fine skills and teach them a little bit to do that. Sometimes you get these younger kids who catch on pretty fast and we can move them over to the older court even if they are physically not ready.”

While teaching the game is a huge premise of this camp, it also allows the older middle school kids to get a feel of what is soon to come. “We have some eighth graders here who have some potential with some height and athleticism who know this will be their last middle school season, and they know they will come back next year into high school, the pressure will be on,” Garcia said. 

One of the biggest things Garcia and his staff get to enjoy is watching their high school players interact with the future players. And just as important, it helps build their leadership skills as role models for the younger players. “It is a big thing,” Garcia said. “One thing, a lot of our incoming freshman who are here can relate to some of those incoming seventh and eighth graders. Then you have the younger players who get to look up to, for example Savannah Clawson, who is a two-time state award varsity player. She is here on the floor helping the kids. It is big because these high school players are giving back, when once upon a time, somebody gave back to them. These younger kids are excited to see them.”

Next week, the story continues as I spoke to Garcia about the season ahead and the magic that could happen with so many returning players from last year’s regional semifinal team.