{"id":34369,"date":"2025-07-30T13:10:49","date_gmt":"2025-07-30T13:10:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/34369\/"},"modified":"2025-07-30T13:10:49","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T13:10:49","slug":"luka-doncic-uses-pickleball-padel-to-level-up-physique-ahead-of-nba-season-pickleball","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/34369\/","title":{"rendered":"Luka Doncic Uses Pickleball, Padel to Level Up Physique Ahead of NBA Season | Pickleball"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/152374553.jpg\" alt=\"Luka Doncic\" title=\"Luka Doncic\"\/><\/p>\n<p>NBA Icon Luka Doncic in frame (Credit: X)<\/p>\n<p>Luka Doncic, the Los Angeles Lakers superstar, has decided to keep himself in shape. However, this time he is also relying on a new training regimen involving racket sports like pickleball and padel.<\/p>\n<p>Doncic, 26, is being helped by trainer An\u017ee Macek, physiotherapist Javier Barrio, and nutritionist Lucia Almendros.<\/p>\n<p>According to a report in Men&#8217;s Health, the trio of experts (known as &#8220;Team Luka&#8221;) tried to reduce the amount of time Doncic spent on the basketball court over the last few months and replace it with other activities instead.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He disagreed at first. But he quickly filled the time with a weights routine that helped him build total-body strength. And he eventually found a distraction playing pickleball and padel, sometimes against friends, sometimes with Barrio and Macek,&#8221; said writers Andrew Heffernan and Ebenezer Samuel. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;For Doncic, the new games were a blast from his childhood past, long before he fell in love with basketball. They challenged new muscles, relieving his knees, thanks to fewer vertical jumps, while strengthening adductors, glutes, and ankles with footwork.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;At the beginning, it was hard,&#8221; said Doncic. &#8220;I can&#8217;t be without basketball. But when I was a little kid, I played a lot of sports.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Stay connected with all the latest news on Pickleball, exclusive behind-the-scenes content, tips, and inspiration you won&#8217;t find anywhere else. Your ultimate destination for all things pickleball \u2013 where the community comes together for news, views, and the sport that&#8217;s sweeping the globe. Follow us at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/pickleballnow_\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow noreferrer\">@pickleballnow<\/a> on Instagram and be part of the community!<script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NBA Icon Luka Doncic in frame (Credit: X) Luka Doncic, the Los Angeles Lakers superstar, has decided to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34370,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[26016,26015,26014,49,48,26008,26013,5472,26012,26007,8231,26011,12887,26005,26004,26010,26017,459,26018,26006,82,26009,4074],"class_list":["post-34369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-andrew-heffernan","tag-ane-macek","tag-barrio","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-doncic","tag-ebenezer-samuel","tag-instagram","tag-javier-barrio","tag-latest-pickleball-news","tag-los-angeles-lakers","tag-lucia-almendros","tag-luka-doncic","tag-luka-doncic-padel","tag-luka-doncic-pickleball","tag-macek","tag-men-s-health","tag-nba","tag-pickleball","tag-pickleball-news","tag-sports","tag-team-luka","tag-times-now"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34369"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34369\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}