Rafael Nadal’s new tennis academy in Mallorca is going to be huge—in more ways than one.
The sure-to-be-popular site of Nadal’s tennis camps is being built on a giant piece of land, and will be complete with 26 courts and dorms and a school for students.
“There is the capacity for 140 kids there,” said nadal. “There are rooms, and behind on the lower floor there [will be] a school.”
“For me it’s a motivation to keep going and the motivation to try to help the next generation become good tennis players,” he said.
For those who are looking to send their kids to get the same rigorous training that Nadal did, that might not be the case at the king of clay's academy. “The days of the kids that are going to be here are going to be much easier than my days,” he said. “When I was 12 or 13 or 14 my schedule was crazy. I went to school from 9 to 12, I was practicing tennis, 12 to 2, then going to school from 3 to 5, then playing football 5:30 to 7:30 or 7:00, and a lot of days going back to [tennis] practice from 7 to 9.”
At the groundbreaking for the academy in 2014, Nadal announced that he hoped to have the grounds ready for a summer camp in 2016.