Asian Lady

Ever since my tennis bug bit me again last year, and I got back into tennis, I've started into tennis in all sorts of ways. Recently, I talked to a co-op named Anthony. His dad decided to buy a new tennis racquet for him, the Nadal Babolat racquet. Rather than buy this online, he bought it in Rockville, at a placed called Tennis Topia. I had never heard of the place, even though I had been in the general vicinity a few times.

Tennis Topia is located on the back side of REI, which does face Rockville Pike. I recently broke a string, something I haven't done in a long, long time partly because I'm using Luxilons and these things are amazing when it comes to durability. I recently tried a hybrid, using synthetics on the mains, and Luxilons on the crosses. Some pros (like Federer) do that so they can feel and durability.

I would have gotten it strung at the person I like to get it done with, who works in College Park at 3-Stripe. He strings tons of racquets, and is quick. If he's there, he does it right away. Being a guy maybe a few years out of college, he's a one-man show, like most stringers I've seen.

The stringer at Tennis Topia is an Asian woman, and her style is quite different. Tennis Topia does enough business that several high school student types work there, and this woman utilizes them like surgeons utilize their assistants or chefs utilize their line chefs. In particular, they do some prep work (cutting the strings off old racquets, getting strings out of the package, and if only half are used, putting the strings back in the package, making accurate notes of what strings are being used).

She wants things orderly and prompt. The high school students seem a bit nervous, as she tells them what she wants done. I had asked her about whether she'd string my racquet in two pieces. I knew that racquets could be strung this way, with one string for the mains and one string for the crosses. You can also string as one-piece. Some racquets (mine in particular) apparently require two pieces otherwise you can damage the racquet. I found this out talking to Tom, the stringer at 3-Stripe.

Fortunately, Asian Lady also knew this. I talked to a guy who suggested I try the Ace Luxilon, which is apparently a softer string. The woman suggested that I use something else in the crosses (I think). She put in Gamma TNT 17's. We'll see how long they last (reviews suggest, not that long!). Anyway, we'll see how they feel. If the break too rapidly, I may simply go with the Ace all the way through.

Anyway, I have to thank her for stringing the racquet as I waited. I was told I'd have to wait til Monday to get the racquet strung, in which case, I would have headed down to College Park and had it strung there instead on Sunday.

Did I mention she has a sweet Babolat stringer? It looks like something out of Wall-E (mostly, it looks a little like Eve).

I have to imagine the students that work there will get some lesson about precision and keeping orderly. They may not find it a pleasant experience (fortunately, she's not a particularly rude person), I think they'll learn something about keeping orderly, and that seems like a good lesson to learn.

Roddick and Babolat

I don't know what the most popular racquets have been in the past. The Jack Kramer Pro Staff was popular, but undoubtedly due to the number of years his racquet was available. Once upon a time, a racquet might be on the market 10-20 years, and sell well the whole time. These days, companies make new racquets every few years.

Another popular racquet was the Pro Staff 6.0 (or was it 6.1). Both Pete Sampras and Stefan Edberg used this racquet almost exclusively during their career. Jimmy Connors used it briefly when he abandoned the steel T-2000. Recall the 1984 Super Saturday? Connors pushed McEnroe to a fifth set. He used the Pro Staff. That was popular for a while too.

But I've seen one racquet that's been out there everywhere. Is it the racquet used by Roger Federer, which is an update to the Pro Staff, call the Pro Staff Six One (spelled out, rather than numerically written out)? Is it the racquet used by Djokovic? Or Nadal?

No, it's Andy Roddick's racquet. I have one of the older Pure Drive racquets. I see this racquet all over the place. Andy Roddick hasn't had the career that Federer has had, not even the career Nadal had.

But...he does have a huge serve. If chicks love the long ball, then tennis players love the big serve. It's hard to believe any rational tennis player would get a racquet based on how a pro hits it, but then, I've done the same, so I'm plenty guilty (I am willing to say, to my defense, that I pick racquets, these days, by pro styles, rather than whether I like the pro--though that doesn't explain why Roddick's racquet has done so well).

Roddick uses a racquet that now bears his name, undoubtedly because he put Babolat on the map. This isn't to say Roddick's racquet isn't a good racquet, because I think it's pretty good. But, I bet this is what happened. People saw Roddick and said "Here's a good looking guy with a huge serve. If I could get a fraction of his pace, I'd be set".

Yesterday, I saw a guy with a Roddick racquet, yet another of those proficient Asian players that seem to abound. But he was a lefty, and he clearly modeled his game not after Roddick, but after Rafa Nadal. And for an imitation, he's was strikingly effective. Sure, he doesn't cover the court like Rafa, not hit it with the same pace, but he's starting to be the kind of player that, when you stare at them on the court, you say "that's a good player".

Even his two-handed backhand appeared to be an imitation of the Nadal backhand.

In any case, pay attention to your neighbors and see if they have a Babolat.

Racquets: Head Microgel Prestige/Dunlop Aerogel 2Hundred

The newest trend in racquets appear to be this really odd space-age (is space-age now even a modern term?) material called "aerogels". An aerogel is noted for being very "airy". You can literally put a blowtorch underneath it, and put something above it, and it won't catch fire. It dissipates heat very well.

How this helps with a tennis racquet, I have no idea, and how they even use it in the racquet, I have no idea. I think they just like the name. The tennis racquet industry loves to use new materials, and the popularity of the racquets always seems to reduce the cost of the material (thus, graphite is a lot cheaper now because racquets are mass-produced).

I rented out these two racquets. The problem with many racquets in a company, is that a whole series of racquets sound alike, and most companies make over a dozen models of the racquet. So, there's the Head Microgel Prestige, and there's a Prestige Pro, and there is an Microgel Extreme. You really have to pay attention to find out which is which.

Both these racquets are in the 11 ounce range. They are both densely strung (16 by 19 patterns). Ravi tried them out, and noticed they have more weight in the head than the racquet he was using (a Dunlop M-Fil 2Hundred Plus), which is one of those in-between racquets (it uses the same color scheme as the 2Hundred).

The grips on both are similar, in that they are a touch short (not as bad as Wilson's racquets) for two-handed play. I found them both to be fine racquets, though I'm beginning to suspect that good strings can make a difference. These racquets are priced similarly to mine, but didn't feel nearly as good.

The Head Microgel Prestige had a more "rectangular" grip, which seems typical of Head racquets. By rectangular, I mean that its width and height are not the same. It feels strange, but I managed. I liked it somewhat better on serves when trying to spin it. Neither seemed to hit particularly hard, at least, nothing different from the racquet I currently use (RDS 001).

Overall, either racquet is decent. I think I prefer the Prestige, but only mildly so. It wasn't as awful as the one Prince racquet I tried earlier on, and felt a bit similar to the Wilson racquets. I'd only go against the Wilsons because their short grips bother me too much.

So far, the racquets with the best two-handed grips are the Babolats, probably because the top two pros using it (Nadal and Roddick) use two hands on their backhands.

Picking a Tennis Racquet

I've been asked to offer some advice on how to pick a tennis racquet, but I figure other people might find my answer useful.

Let me briefly cover the history of tennis racquets. Once upon a time, tennis racquets were wood. They came in a standard size (about 65 square inches). You needed a wood press to prevent the racquet from getting warped due to humidity. Because they were made of wood, they were somewhat heavy. Racquets typically weight about 12 ounces or more, some as heavy as a pound.

The late 60s through the 1980s ushered a bunch of new ideas. Companies made racquets out of metal. The most famous was the unusually designed Wilson T-2000, which Jimmy Connors used for years. It used an unusual hoop of wire that the strings would weave through. By the mid 70s, racquets were made of other material, including fiberglass.

The big revolution was the oversized racquet. The Prince racquet came out at 110 square inches, or nearly twice the area of the original racquets. The earliest ones were made of aluminum. These racquets turned out to be too big for many pros who found the power too great, and so a series of "mid-sized" racquets came out. Most of these were sized about half-way, typically about 85 square inches.

The other big revolution was graphite racquets. This material was not only strong (though you can still break such a racquet, unlike metal racquets), it was also light. Unlike wood racquets, it didn't warp. Unlike metal racquets, it didn't have that clangy feel. This was so big, that once it hit, wooden racquets were on their way out. By the late 80s, you could hardly buy a wooden racquet.

By the 90s, racquets were getting bigger in size. Midsized moved from 85 square inches to 90, to 95 square inches. Indeed racquets between 95 and 100 square inches were called mid-plus racquets, a name that still exists today.

Although oversized racquets are still common, there seems to be, lately, a resurgence to slightly smaller racquets. Federer and Djokovic, the number 1 and 3 players, use a racquet about 90 to 93 square inches. Michael Chang, during his career, played with 110 square inches.

There's one revolution that came and went. Widebody racquets. The first ultra-wide racquets were introduced by Wilson. It was called the Wilson Profile. I believe the original design wasn't even Wilson. They simply bought a design. These wide-bodies were ultra-thick in the head. Many racquet manufacturers followed suit and made wide racquets, though like the mid-sized racquets, they made ones that were in between in thickness of the thin ones most people had, and the really thick one from the Wilson Profile.

For some reason, this idea has mostly disappeared. You don't see ultra-wide racquets anymore. Some are modestly wider.

OK, let's now get to picking a racquet.

First, let's start with price. Racquets fall in about three categories. Cheap, which means 40-50 dollars or less. Pro-style racquets, which are 160 dollars to about 200 dollars, and the stuff in-between. If you play reasonably well, and you have the money, I'd opt for the pro-style racquets.

Cheap racquets are typically made of metal, usually aluminum. They are painted on top, so you can almost not tell if they are metal or graphite. But lower than a certain price, it's almost surely metal.

Second issue. Racquet head size. There's midsized and there's oversized. I generally feel oversized are a bit too big, and typically opt for a mid-plus. Midsizes are typically 90 square inches. Midplusses are 95 to 100 square inches. Oversized are 110 square inches. There's a trade-off for volleying. Bigger racquets give you more to hit with, but then there is some trampolining making it harder to hit with too.

Third issue. Weight. Racquets fall in several weight categories. There are the ultra-light racquets, which are about 9 ounces or less. Most of these typically compensate on the lightness by being head-heavy. If you were to pick the mid-point of the tip of one end of the racquet to the other and put that point on a balance, then if it tips to the part with the strings, it's head heavy. If it tips to the handle, it's head-light.

Racquets typically tell you whether they are head-heavy (HH) or head-light (HL), and use a "point" system, each point being 1/8 of an inch. Head-heavy and head-light refer to "balance". Generally, people say that head-light racquets are better for volleying, but I find that the combination of weight and balance matters, not simply head-heavy or head-light.

Pros tend to use heavier racquets, leaning to 11 or more ounces. This is still generally lighter than wood racquets. I prefer to use a heavier racquet. I believe that these racquets are, in a sense, both less and more powerful than a lighter racquet. This is hard to describe. A light racquet allows you to swing faster, but then you sorta need to swing fast to get good pace. A heavier racquet lets you swing a touch slower, and still get a good pace.

If you play with a heavy and light racquet, you will notice a big difference in feel, though it is, to some extent, a matter of personal preference. I tend to prefer the heavier racquets. You can control the racquet's weight, somewhat, by adding lead tape, if you want to play with the weight.

Fourth, there is the string pattern. Usually, they fall into the 16 by 18 variety or the 18 by 20 variety. The patterns are said to be open and dense, respectively. Openly strung racquets are said to be better for spin, since the strings give a bit more. Having said that, some racquets are pretty good at spin, despite being densely strung.

Finally, there's the grip (and racquet) length. If you play with two hands, then you'll probably want a racquet with a longish grip. Otherwise, you will find your hand partly on the racquet.

There are things you can generally control when you buy a racquet. There's grip size (which go from 4 1/8 up to 4 7/8 inches, though it's hard to find at those extremes. Mostly, you can find 4 3/8 up to 4 5/8). They say you should pick the biggest size that's comfortable. Having said that, Martina had bigger hands than Chris Evert, but used a smaller grip size.

You can also pick the string and the tension of the string. I would say, if you have no preference, pick the generic string, and pick the middle of the recommended tension. In general, higher tensions provide more control, but feel more board-like, and lower tensions provide more power, but feel better. McEnroe and Borg were two ends of the extremes. Borg strung his tiny racquet at 80 pounds. McEnroe strung his at 40 pounds, where typical, for those racquets was about 50 pounds (Mac did use a mid-sized racquet throughout the 80s).

My general advice in picking a racquet is to try one for yourself. Although I've never done it, Tennis Warehouse lets you try out racquets for a week, up to 4 at a time. I would try that out, if you can.

Although I typically recommend trying out racquets, I have fallen into the lull of picking racquets used by famous players. Thus, I've used a Rossignol by Wilander (or similar), a Donnay by Agassi, which I hated, a Babolat by Roddick, which is decent, and a Yonex used by Nalbandian, which is my latest racquet.

My latest racquet, which I got very recently, is a Yonex RDS 001. It's bright yellow, and a bit slighter than my previous racquet, a Yonex RDS 003. I like both racquets a fair bit. Both were mid-plus racquets.

I tried Federer's racquet, which is the Six-One and Djokovic's racquet, which is the Wilson Blade. They were OK to me. The racquets had short grips, which I really didn't care for, so they were a no-go for me. Many years ago, I tried Wilson, and didn't care for them. I also tried some Prince racquets then, and again, felt the head was too slight. I tried one recently, and didn't care for it either.

Perhaps due to Andy Roddick's popularity, the Babolat Pure Drive Roddick seems really popular now. You aren't going to serve like Roddick, but it's got decent power and pretty good spin (well, the one Babolat racquet I have, that is). Nadal also uses a Babolat (Aeropro Drive), so that might be worth trying out.

I was planning to try a Dunlop Aerogel 2Hundred, which is the one that is used by James Blake, but have yet to try that out. I tried a Dunlop once, and that was pretty good, but the racquet is like 10 years old. Another one I might look at, but have never tried, is the Head Microgel Extreme Pro, which three pros use. These days, most pros are groundstrokers, that occasionally volley, so I think most racquets in use by pros should serve as good groundstroking racquets.

I would suggest buying two things on top of the racquet itself. If you can find it, buy head tape. You're likely to scrape the racquet, even though it has some protection on it. Also, get a vibration dampener.

There you go.

Seeing Yellow

I had a little extra money in the bank for once. I had told myself I wanted to buy a new racquet (yet another one). I've bought perhaps 10 racquets in my life. Let me think. My dad bought the first three racquets I used. He bought an old wooden racquet. Then, I got a T-2000. Jimmy Connors used to use it. It was 35-40 dollars back when a hundred dollars seemed like a lot for a racquet. Then, I got the F-250. I still own that racquet. It was a more up-to-date model of the racquet Mats Wilander used. Still tiny by today's standards. I still have an overwrap on a racquet I haven't used for nearly twenty years.

I then bought a Donnay Agassi racquet, a racquet Agassi only briefly used, although he did win Wimbledon with that racquet. Agassi played with a Prince for many years, then Donnay briefly, then Head for the rest of his career. Unlike Sampras or Becker, Agassi was flexible enough to use other racquets. I really didn't like that racquet at all. I think I may have let someone borrow it, and it never got back to me. That's fine.

I tried testing out some racquets, renting some, seeing what I liked, and eventually settled on a Dunlop racquet. I bought two of them that were on some sale, probably Father's Day, at a local Sports Authority. They were seventy dollars each. I still have both racquets (I think--at least one).

After that, I didn't get a new racquet for quite a while. Once I started having some time, I bought three racquets in somewhat rapid succession. I bought a Babolat, which Roddick used to use. I forget the reason I didn't care for that racquet, but I didn't. So I decided to get a Yonex RDS 003. It's a red squarish racquet. I liked the way it felt on groundstrokes. It volleyed pretty well too. I had been using that for a while.

However, I want to moved to a somewhat heavier racquet. I had played with some Wilsons and Princes and still have never been so happy with that racquet.

So I went ahead, on March 4, to get the RDS 001. This is a bright yellow racquet that was used by Lleyton Hewitt, and David Nalbandian still uses it.

I had expected the racquet to feel a lot like the racquet I was using. After all, it's another RDS racquet. It's in the same line.

But it doesn't feel the same. It feels...thinner. That's the best I can describe it. A little less power, but it spins a bit better on serves than my current racquet. I almost like the fact it has a little less power because I feel I can swing at it a little harder.

I remember reading a review on the Wilson K-Blade, which I believe Djokovic used. This guy had used the RDS-001, and claimed this new racquet was somehow a revelation, even though he couldn't say how. I feel something like this about this new racquet, though I'm sure it's just the newness of the racquet. Maybe it's the slightly matte finish as opposed to the shinier, glossier finish of my older racquet.

And the older racquet? I'm planning to sell it. I forget that the main problem with selling a racquet is that people can be sensitive to the grip size. This guy prefers a bigger grip than the one my racquet has. I used to get 4 5/8 inch racquets, especially when I first started. Then, I went down to 4 1/2, and have been there pretty much ever since. 4 3/8 feels way too small.

Is this the answer? Maybe not. But it feels good so far.

And that's a good start.

Speedport Tour

I finally found out what racquet I tried out a few weeks ago. Here is is: the Prince Speedport Tour. Very orange.

As I mentioned earlier, I didn't particularly care for this racquet. I've never liked Prince racquets that much. I playtested a few quite a few years ago. They've always felt a bit slight in the head, I thought.

Prince was the original oversized racquet, so I have to hand it to them.

Racquet Testing

I haven't play-tested racquets in maybe ten years. RnJ Sports in Rockville, however, loans out a good set of racquets for 3 dollars each, which can be reimbursed for the cost of a racquet. The main problem with RnJ is that they only carry three brands of racquets: Head, Wilson, and Prince. Undoubtedly, these are the three big companies in racquets.

However, there's now a few other brands out there that deserve note, but I can understand how a place that primarily specializes in running, and then does tennis as an afterthought (though not a trivial underthought-what they do, they do pretty well).

In particular, there are a few new brands out there that were nowhere, but now are somewhat recognizable. In particular, Babolat, which had, for years, made strings, has now gone into the racquet making business. This isn't so weird. Technifibre is another company that makes strings, but now also makes racquets. And, look at Prince, which used to make tennis ball machines, or Rossignol, which used to make skis (Rossignol doesn't seem to make racquets anymore).

Some companies have gone by the wayside. Slazenger is no longer around. They probably couldn't make the transition to non-wood racquets. Tennis Warehouse, a large tennis racquet company, sells Avery, Boris Becker, Fischer, Vokyl, ProKennex, Dunlop, Donnay, and Yonex racquets.

My current racquet is a Yonex RDS-003, which is red, midplus racquet, which is a hair over 11 ounces. It's a decent racquet and I like it, but I want to try out a new racquets out.

The main racquet I wanted to try was the KSix-One 95, which is somewhat bigger than the one Federer uses, and a bit lighter.

Ah, let me go through a bit of tennis racquet history. The original racquets were wooden. They were all uniformly about 66 square inches. When oversized racquets came out, they were 110 square inches. Prince was the first to popularize these racquets, and Pam Shriver, the first player to make a splash with an oversized racquet.

Most pros found, at the time, difficulty adjusting to the huge racquets. They weren't used to the power. Racquet companies started making midsize racquets, most of them around 85 square inches, or some 30% larger than the old ones. Lendl grew up using the original sizes, so his racquet was a modest 72 square inches.

But the midsizes weren't that much more powerful than the oversized, so racquet sizes started getting bigger. Racquets started creeping towards 95 to 100 square inches, and were titled mid-plus racquets.

However, many pros learned to play with one of the most popular racquets Wilson ever made: the Wilson Pro Staff Graphite. It was about 85 square inches, which was typical of midsized racquets. In particular, Pete Sampras and Stefan Edberg used this racquet, and for that matter, so did Roger Federer.

The other huge innovation that came out in the late 80s was the Profile racquet, called widebodies. Nearly every company created a widebody racquet. Here's the unusual thing. They're almost all gone. Maybe a racquet is a hair wider than it used to be. Dunno.

So anyway, I tried (I think) the Ozone Pro Tour MP, which is an orange-ish racquet. I didn't like the feel of the racquet. It felt a bit light (even though it was at least 11 ounces or more) and more like a metal racquet. I also tried the racquet that was a bit larger than Federer's. It was good to serve, was decent on the forehand, nice for slicing, but not easy to get power on the topspin, and the grip was a bit short for a two-handed shot. Nice, but I'm not sure I'd switch to it.

So two racquets down. Might try a few more.