Another gold medalist in the family? Rafael Nadal hits the slopes with wife Mery and son Rafa Jr.

While a tennis academy bears his name in his native Mallorca, Rafael Nadal has remained noncommittal on his desire to coach future champions on the court.

As far as other sports, though, that's another story—especially, it seems, for his own family.

For the first time in 26 years, according to the King of Clay himself, Nadal hit the ski slopes this week at Baqueira Beret, a luxury ski resort in the Catalan Pyrenees, where he enjoyed some winter fun with his wife Maria Francisca Perello and 3-year-old son, Rafa Jr.

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Nadal said it was an "incredible feeling" to ski for the first time since his early teens, after more than three decades of carefully managing an injury-prone body in his tennis career. And he enjoyed it further still as he guided the eldest of his two sons in a lesson, and paused the action to build a snowman together.

Though little Rafa, Jr. looked to be a natural in the adorable video Nadal posted to social media, the Spaniard said he'd rather see his son in expert hands.

"We’re still learning … any advice for us?" he asked, tagging American Olympic champion and noted tennis fan Lindsey Vonn.

“We have to ski together when I’m healthy!” Vonn later replied. The 41-year-old Vonn suffered a complex fracture of her tibia after a crash at the recently-concluded Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics and needed three surgeries to correct the injury.

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That's a feeling Nadal knows well. The 39-year-old played the final match of his illustrious tennis career at the 2024 Davis Cup Finals, having suffered foot and hip injuries—the latter requiring surgery—in the final years of his career, and also had surgery in January on severe osteoarthritis in his right hand.

But he's stayed active since hanging up his racquets, including on the golf course with longtime rival Roger Federer, and even on the tennis court, including a practice session with academy alumna Alexandra Eala.

"After retiring, I was in bad shape for a month, I practically couldn't walk," he said last summer during Wimbledon. "[Now], I'm better than I could have imagined."