Asia’s biggest pickleball finals set Asian prize-money record in Foshan
Foshan’s Lishui Town turned a new pickleball center into a record-setting finals stage, with more than 1,300 players chasing a 2.29 million yuan purse.
The APBA Pickleball Open Grand Finals turned the FJAKA Homeland·Ruiling Pickleball International Center in Lishui Town into more than a tournament site. It became the latest bid to put Foshan on the map as a pickleball destination, with five days of matches, an international field and a prize pool officials said set a new Asian record.
More than 1,300 athletes from 11 countries and regions entered the finals in Nanhai District, including players from China, Malaysia, Singapore, Mongolia, South Korea, the United States, Vietnam and the Netherlands. APBA’s March launch announced a 3 million yuan season-finals prize pool and described it as an Asian record, while Foshan officials later put the total event purse at 2.29 million yuan. Local reporting said 640,000 yuan was set aside for the club singles event, with club singles and U-series finals together accounting for 840,000 yuan.
The competition was spread across 20 events in four age divisions, and APBA also introduced its first-ever MicroPickleball format on the international stage. That mix of age-group play, club competition and a new format gave the finals a wider shape than a standard bracket run, with the event presented as a showcase for how fast the sport is organizing across the Asia-Pacific region.
For Lishui, the value of the finals went beyond medals and money. Local officials tied the event to sightseeing routes and a ticket-economy spending model, saying the competition would help more than 50 restaurants, leisure venues and hotels benefit from visitor traffic. Foshan and APBA also framed the tournament as a way to connect Guangzhou and Foshan through sports tourism and regional consumption, using the finals to draw movement, spending and attention across the Greater Bay Area.
That is the bigger story inside the new center in Lishui: a town using a major international finals week to prove it can host, support and sell a pickleball destination. With the first APBA finals in Lishui now in the books, the venue has done what a true hub does best, it has made the courts part of the travel appeal.
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