Young athlete is the youngest Bahian to secure the International Beach Tennis title

Young athletes from Bahia continue to break records day after day in the state’s sports scene. This week, Pedro Barros, 15 years old, became the youngest Bahian to secure the international Beach Tennis title. On Sunday (21), Pedro won the ITF BT10 held in Petrolina, Pernambuco, in a competition valid for the Beach Tennis World Circuit, which brings together several athletes who practice the sport.

The little athlete made his debut in the professional category and is projected to reach the best ranking of his brief career. The tennis player is currently among the best players in the world.

“The feeling is one of great joy as years of work have been done for the results to arrive, and seeing what the several hours of training a day have paid off is very motivating”, said the athlete in an exclusive conversation with Bahia Notícias .

“Now the responsibility increases, as I am opening a path for the new Bahian generation of beach tennis that has been growing with some names that will still be seen many times”, he concluded.

To BN, the athlete’s coach and father, Léo Barros, revealed that he has worked with his son since he was very young with a focus on high performance in accordance with the demands of his age. For Léo, the result is received with great joy due to the difficulties required by the sport.

“I’m very happy, I’m a father and I’m a coach. We are there in this work so that he develops and evolves like an athlete for a long time, at least six years. He started as a little boy, took up the sport and enjoyed the sport between the ages of 8 and 9. We have been doing work with an emphasis on him having a high performance within the perspective of each age. It is the joy that what has been done so far has been good and correct and despite all the adversities of being in Bahia, of being one of the last states where the sport gains strength and professionalism. It is indeed a very significant achievement”, celebrated Léo.

Pedro Barros alongside his family | Photo: Reproduction / Instagram

With a very impressive history due to his age, Pedro has already beaten athletes from the top 10 in the world and has been twice runner-up in Bahia in the Professional category and champion several times in other categories. In the midst of the little sportsman’s development process, Barros revealed that his son has a different life from his peers by choice and with each passing year he has increasingly improved his competitiveness.

“We respected each age. The work began in a more playful way at the beginning and the idea was to cooperate on the technical side in carrying out the actions so that it could already create a well-consolidated and well-built base. As he grew, it was clear that the recreational part was losing space and the ingredients of performance and improvement of the tactical part, vision of the game and competitiveness were entering the preparation. Today he is a young athlete with the capacity to compete at the age of 15 against other professionals”, said the beach tennis player’s father.

“Reconciling is not easy. Anyone who has an athlete child knows that it is a different life than anyone else. He has a different sleep time, a different diet and a different workload dedicated to other functions. He has to study more concentrated because he needs to do his physical preparation, he needs to travel, train and play throughout the week and he spends a lot of time away from school. It’s not easy, he doesn’t go to the same parties as his friends, he can’t marathon series like his friends do because of training. It’s a different life he chose and I’m with him in this project. The child has to want it, it cannot be the father’s will. The father participates but the effective renunciation comes from the child”, he concluded.

Despite his already advanced achievements, Pedro is new to the international professional circuit and entered in January of this year and before moving up a level, he was already competing on the national circuit. In his brief career, the young beach tennis player went through a complicated calendar, participating in a series of tournaments spread across different locations around the world. In February this year, he spent 10 days competing in Portugal and will soon hold a tournament in Feira de Santana.

Even with a vast schedule of competitions, Léo Barros emphasizes that the competitions will be chosen according to financial viability and the competition ranking. The more Pedro rises in the ranking, the greater the possibility of competing in higher caliber competitions.

The child record holder remains on a list of few athletes who achieved the feat of winning an international tournament at such a young age and also played for the Bahia Beach Tennis Team, where all the youth categories in which he competed were highlighted, including under-12, under-14 and under-16, and is the first in Bahia in the ranking of the under 18 category, even at an early age.