ACROSS THE COUNTRY

Residents who love fitness and socializing — and can afford to play — cannot get enough of padel, the racket sport with international cachet.

WHY WE’RE HERE

We’re exploring how America defines itself one place at a time. Miami is a city whose language and culture are more akin to Latin America and Europe than to the rest of the United States, making it a perfect hub for the racket sport padel.

At least once a week, María Mercedes Ortega, a 32-year-old real estate agent and spa owner, puts on a stylish ensemble and meets up with her girlfriends. Not to go bar hopping or clubbing, diversions she says she left behind in her 20s, but to play padel, Miami’s trendiest sport.

Yes, it’s a satisfying workout — “It’s great for the legs,” she said. But just as important, padel is “a very high-level social activity,” as Ms. Ortega put it.

Many of the city’s well-heeled and wellness inclined have developed a fervor for padel, the racket sport that is easier than tennis, harder than pickleball and more exclusive than both. Indoor and outdoor padel courts, with their signature glass walls, are proliferating in warehouses, parks, former parking lots. There are courts at the Ritz-Carlton in Key Biscayne, and plans for some on the roof of a garage in Miami Beach. A $2 billion development underway in Midtown boasts that it will include the nation’s largest padel club.

Padel, pronounced PAH-del from pádel, its name in Spanish, was born in Mexico and popularized in Spain and Argentina. With its Hispanic roots and international cachet, it has proved perfect for Miami, a city more akin in its language and culture to Latin America and Europe than to the rest of the United States. More often than not, the players who pack South Florida’s padel courts speak to each other in Spanglish.

Like many Miamians, padel “immigrated here,” said Javier Colberg, a 39-year-old real estate agent from Puerto Rico, who was playing on a recent morning at the Wynwood Padel Club, north of downtown.