Review of LKT Toxic 5 blade

I got hold of one of these blades since someone had cracked one, and so required a new one. It was only cracked in the direction of the fibres, so once I got some glue in there and clamped it, it stuck back together beautifully and was as new....BONUS!

This blade is oversize and very BIG! I could not fit any of my used rubbers on there since there were not even close to fitting! So I managed to locate some rubbers I had put aside for evaluation, but had not got around to it yet. I was a Friendship 755 faster long pimple rubber 0.8mm and a Gambler 4 kings 2.0mm.

Well it took me while to get used to this combination, and to figure out what it would be suitable for. This blade is real slow, probably around ALL, and really takes the pace out of the ball. For blocking and counterhitting with the Gambler rubber the ball came back real slow, and even for driving and looping it was hard to get real good pace. But for brush looping, which is mainly dependant on the rubber not the blade, it came off quite fast. This provided quite a contrast...

With the 755 faster blocking and counterhitting was really nice. Since the blade has such great dwell time, I had great control on all my shots. Normally this rubber is too fast for me, being one of the fastest long pimpled rubber around, but this blade made it very manageble, even for chopping away from the table.

When I started playing a more passive game away from the table, I realised where this blade excels. I had great control with ALL my shots, and the great dwell time of the blade made it real easy to manipulate spin. I could float the ball and return very heavy backspin with ease. With the Gambler rubber this combination does not have enough power to hit winners from medium to far distance, but with a fast glued up rubber this would still be an option.

I think this blade suits modern type defender, with either 2 control type rubbers or a combination of a slower long pimpled rubber and a control rubber on the other side. It has enough power to put the ball away when you come in closer, but from mid-far distance you'll have to rely on strategy and spin manipulation to win points...

The LKT Toxic 3 blade looks very similar to this one, but is quite a bit slower. It is easily the slowest blade I've even seen. It just seems to suck ALL the energy out of the ball!