Peruvian siblings use pickleball to give back to their country

Two short years ago Miranda Cabieses picked up a pickleball paddle for the first time.

“I started playing like every single day,” Miranda said. “Two weeks after I was playing my first tournament and since that moment I knew that I wanted to be a professional pickle player.”

Now she plays the game she loves as a professional.

Miranda’s older brother Hercilio is also a professional pickleball player.

He played collegiate tennis and became a pro pickleball player during the pandemic.

Not long after Miranda arrived at FGCU and got into the game big time.

“Pickle changed my life, 360, so I want to give back too,” Miranda said.

To do that Miranda and Hercilio launched the Cabieses Foundation.

The goal is to introduce the game to kids in Peru and give them the equipment they need to play.

Sister and brother also travel through Latin America putting on clinics.

“It just keeps pushing us to keep growing the sport,” Hercilio said.

Miranda is off to Peru this week to kick off that nation’s second pickleball tournament.

Then she’ll gear up to compete in the World Pickleball Cup in Lima which of course is sponsored by the Cabieses Foundation

“It’s going to be an event that people are going to talk about all over the world and we just want to keep growing,” Hercilio said.

All of the funds raised through the World Pickleball Cup go to the Cabieses Foundation to get even more people interested in what is already America’s fastest growing sport.

Miranda does all of her schoolwork online so that she can work with the foundation in Peru, but she did start FGCU’s pickleball club during one of her visits to southwest Florida.

For more information about the Cabieses Foundation visit @CabiesesFoundation or @PickleballPeru on Instagram.