- Abel Lusa runs the famed Cambio de Tercio Spanish restaurant in west London
- In the 30 years since its founding, Lusa has played host to tennis’ great and good
- The restauranteur also oversees a number of player dining set ups at Slams
The most well-connected man in tennis isn’t a former player, a broadcaster, or a tournament director. It isn’t even an agent. Arguably, it is a restauranteur.
And most haven’t heard of his restaurants. He doesn’t oversee a global franchise like Nobu, or self-promote aggressively like Salt Bae. Instead, his three Spanish restaurants, clustered on the same stretch of Old Brompton Road in South Kensington which he has made his personal fiefdom, remain spots for the in-the-know for most of the season.
But as spring turns to summer every year and the British grass-court season kicks off in earnest, Abel Lusa welcomes the great and the good of the tennis world, past, present and future, through the doors of Cambio de Tercio.
The names of his favoured clients make eye-popping reading. Rafael Nadal, of course, who in turn introduced Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic, and Andy Murray, Feliciano Lopez, Garbine Muguruza, Tim Henman, Jack Draper – his brother, IMG agent Ben Draper is ‘a good friend’, as many clients are – and Carlos Alcaraz, who is so addicted to his cooking that Cambio de Tercio will often send dishes home with the two-time Wimbledon champion if he cannot make it in person.
The way into tennis’ heart, it seems, is through its stomach.
Lusa is a born host, open and convivial, who talks in paragraphs, not sentences. He is also life-long tennis fan who idolised Pete Sampras as a young man, ideally poised for a twist-of-fate friendship with a Spanish member of the ATP to spark a domino effect that soon saw almost every one of the game’s big names cross his restaurant’s threshold when the tour moves to the capital.
A stone’s throw from the Queen’s Club, which then hosted just a men’s tournament, and the right side of London for Wimbledon, word of mouth spread fast.
‘He brought the likes of Carlos Moya, Alex Corrteja, Albert Costa, Alberto Berasategui, Arantxa Sanchez Vicario,’ Lusa told Mail Sport at the All England Lawn Tennis club last week. ‘Back in the time, it was not so popular to rent the house at Wimbledon -maybe for the top 10 – but the rest of the people, they all used to stay around Gloucester Road, the Millennium Hotel, or the Holiday Inn near our restaurant.
‘So we started quickly having all the French players and other nationalities as well. And then, because I was a tennis fan, we started, starting going to all the matches here at Wimbledon. And the they would all come for dinner, because they were staying near here.’
With entourages smaller and privacy a lesser concern in a mostly analogue age, Lusa’s restaurants quickly became an official clubhouse to mingle with their peers and enjoy a longed-for taste of home amid globe-trotting on the circuit.
‘When players used to travel around the world to other tournaments, they would rarely encounter Spanish restaurants,’ Lusa noted. ‘Usually at the time was mostly Italians. These days, Japanese, Italian, whatever. But still today, there are not so many (like my restaurants) restaurants, whatever they travel and that’s basically how it all started. That generation obviously brought the next one.’
The next one contained a new icon – Nadal – who became synonymous with Cambio de Tercio’s tennis credentials.
‘With Rafa, he quickly became my hero, and I look after him very well. I’m a very close friend of Uncle Toni,’ Lusa adds. ‘He’s one of my best friends in the industry. And we traveled to many, many tournaments. I used to sit with them pretty much every time at the box at Wimbledon. I always joke with my clients that I was the nutritionist, so they all laugh at that. Can I authorise myself the nutritionist of Rafa?’
For Nadal, it was Cambio de Tercio’s Galician octopus with potatoes, capers, and paprika that fueled his grass-court season, and ‘turbot, sea bass, and raw fish’. Cambio de Tercio would also play host to his celebrations after winning Queen’s in 2008, as well as any occasion for triumph in SW19 – even if the restaurant has to play second fiddle to the Wimbledon Champions Dinner.
‘We celebrated Muguruza’s titles, because it was on a Saturday when she won and the defeat as well, when she lost the final again on a Saturday, we celebrated as well,’ Lusa, who is immediately identifiable as a man in no mood to waste the chance for a party, reminisces.
‘We celebrated quarterfinals, semi finals and everything. With Rafa, I think, for three years, he came to Queens, and back in the day, Roland-Garros would finish (on Sunday), Queens begins (on Monday). So he would always arrive on Monday afternoon, and that Monday me, my wife, and his small team, would have dinner with him and celebrate the French Open victory.’
But after over 20 years as the players’ informal canteen, Lusa made their relationship official when Cambio de Tercio opened a pop-up restaurant for players at the Australian Open. While the restaurant’s specialties like patatas bravas, platefuls of Jamon Iberico, and Spanish omelette may not sound immediately identifiable as pre-match fare, the winning formula has translated in spades.
‘We try to bring the finish of a restaurant to the players. Everything has to be (like that),’ Lusa says. ‘And that’s why other tournaments are calling us.
In an ATP and WTA universe where tournaments are trying to tempt the very best talents to their entry lists, the smaller details of the player experience have become crucial, and food, Lusa insists, is a big part of the draw.
‘If you pick a junior from Uzbekistan, these days, if you give him a bad steak or a good steak, a bad croqueta or a good croqueta, he would know the difference very quickly.
‘Everybody talks about the food. I speak to the players, and say, “what about this tournament?” “Rubbish.”, “this is rubbish”, “that’s terrible”. “This is the best”. “This is fantastic.”‘
Not even the venerably upper-crust Wimbledon can escape insider judgement.
‘With due respect, but it’s very poor.’
As a Grand Slam, it won’t be shedding any big names for its facilities, but other events don’t have that luxury. As well as the Australian Open, Cambio de Tercio will cater the Shanghai Masters in the autumn, Queen’s – naturally – Federer’s passion project Laver Cup, and freshly confirmed in SW19, Indian Wells, the ‘tennis paradise’ viewed as the unofficial fifth major.
Music to players’ ears, no doubt, and likely one former Indian Wells champion in particular. While Nadal is his forever icon, Lusa is a card-carrying supporter of his most notable client in this era, Alcaraz.
Alcaraz eats everything – ‘Spanish omelette, patatas bravas, garlic and chili prawns, fish, and meat. He is a perfect, fantastic eater’ – and he’s going to win everything including, Lusa asserts, a third Wimbledon next Sunday.
But as much as the most exciting figure in men’s tennis is treated accordingly at Cambio de Tercio, the restaurant’s popularity stems, in part, from Lusa’s ability to treat everyone he encounters with a similar familiarity.
‘There’s no other restaurant probably anywhere in the world associated to the place like the way we are,’ Lusa says after considering the idea for only a second. ‘If they go to New York, they go to 100 different places. Okay, it might be more popular, but because I’m involved, at Cambio de Tercio, they know it’s me.
‘I greet them and I joke with them, and say, “what did you order? Okay, try this as well, I’m gonna give you this”. They come and say, “can I have this? Can you cook that? “Can you do this tomorrow for me?”
‘This is what makes us different, and also, because they know that I am a passionate (tennis fan). Sometimes they even come to me for advice. In a joking way, because I know the coach maybe, or the agent is a good friend of mine, so they they accept that from me – even if I give them a correction.’
The afternoon is baking hot and Lusa is meeting his wife before they go, of course, to watch Alcaraz on Centre Court. But as he leaves, as if to prove his final point, Lusa makes time to catch up with an old friend. Diego Schwartzman, the recently retired former world No8 is passing through for his first time at Wimbledon as a fan since 2013. Immediate priorities in London? Securing a table at Cambio de Tercio.
