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Lab note · 3 min read · 2026-09-20

The lob is the best shot in padel and the most overused. Both are true. Here is the line between them.

In the Lab's bank the lob is the right answer 28 times and the tempting wrong answer 47 times. Same shot, same word, opposite verdicts. What separates them is not how well you hit it; it is what the other pair is doing when you decide.

Two lobs

Ask a coach what the most important shot in padel is and most will say the lob. Ask what the most common mistake at club level is and most will say the same word. In the puzzle bank both are measurable. Across 303 positions, a lob is the correct call 28 times. A lob is also on the menu as a wrong answer in 47 positions, more than any other shot. The lob is the most offered trap in the bank and the third most common right answer.

When it wins

The 28 winning lobs share a shape. The other pair is at the net and has come close: inside the service line, leaning forward, weight on the front foot. One of them is slow to turn (the chain called "The slow one at the net" is built on this). Or the lob is a reset: you are pinned in a corner, they own the net, and the first job is not to win the point but to get your time back. Or it is a return against a server who runs in behind the serve and gets caught mid-court. In every one of these the lob is not a defensive shot. It is the attack, because it moves them and they cannot stop it moving them.

When it gives the point away

The 47 wrong lobs also share a shape, and it is the mirror. The other pair is at the net but a step back, around the service line, in bandeja range: they want the lob, because the bandeja from there keeps the net and pushes you deeper. Or they are already retreating and a lob simply gives them time to get set on their glass. Or, the classic, the ball is short and sitting up at the net and the lob is the shot of a player who does not want responsibility: the right answer there is the volley to the feet or the drop, twenty-five times in the bank.

The written reasons under those 47 options say the same thing in forty-seven ways: a lob to a pair that is ready for it is a bandeja waiting to happen, and a bandeja is the shot that wins padel matches quietly.

YouPartnerOpponentsBall
The ball is at your feet at the net. What now? A ball below the net cannot be attacked. Block it deep and wait for one above the tape.

What the engine says

The chains on this site are played by a game engine, and before every call the coach in the engine plays each option thirty-two times in his head and keeps the win rate. Those numbers are not a survey; they are what happens when the same position is played out repeatedly with realistic error. Against a pair at the net leaning in, the lob wins in the mid-sixties. Against the same pair a metre deeper, the same lob drops into the forties and the chiquita to the feet climbs past it. One metre of their positioning swings twenty points of your win rate. That is the whole lesson, and it is why the engine will not let a chain be three lobs in a row: the second one is usually the mistake.

How to decide in one look

  • Their heels are inside the service line and their racket is up: lob, and mean it. Aim for their backhand shoulder, deep.
  • They are on or behind the service line, balanced: not yet. Chiquita or block, and make them come closer.
  • They are moving back: hit the ball at their feet as they move; the lob only rescues them.
  • The ball is short and above the net: this is not a lob. It never was.

Play the difference rather than read it: The slow one at the net is the lob as a weapon, Defending the bandeja is the lob as patience, and the lob guide has the technique for both.

YouPartnerOpponentsBall
Both of them are at the net. What is the highest-percentage ball? Only the lob moves a net pair backwards. Everything else invites them forward.

Try it on court: chains on this idea

The slow one at the net

The player on your right at the net is a step slow to turn.

The slow one at the net, from the right

The player on your left at the net is a step slow to turn.

Attack is right 5% of the time

Lab note: Every position in the Lab's bank has one right call and up to three wrong ones, each with a written reason.

Questions people ask

When should you lob in padel?

When the pair at the net has come close (inside the service line, leaning in), when one of them is slow to turn, when you need time back from a corner, or as a return against a server running in. Against a pair sitting on the service line and ready for it, the lob is a bandeja waiting to happen.

Why do I lose points lobbing?

Usually because the other pair wanted the lob: they were a metre deeper than you thought, in bandeja range, and the bandeja from there keeps the net. In the Lab's bank the lob is a wrong answer 47 times and a right one 28; the difference is where they were standing.

Numbers are from the puzzle bank and the game engine on the day of writing; both grow, so the counts will drift. More Lab notes.