I testing it on my Stiga Energy wood WRB, finally had a chance to try it:
In general this rubber has very good control, and is an excellent alround long pimple rubber. The 1.0mm medium soft sponge gave the rubber soft feel and it felt springy, but it did not suffer that much in the short game...
Return of serve: Control was pretty good, was a little sensitive to incoming spin, but not bad at all. This rubber has real good grip... the harder to brush the better the grip.
Generate spin: I did not feel I could generate a lot of spin with this rubber on serves, although the fact that it's almost a year old might be a big factor. You need to dig the ball in a little further to get more spin.
Blocking against loops: Control is good for this, and produced a good sink effect. It reminded me a bit of the Curl TSP p1-r 0.6mm although it was faster and more lively. I could actually feel the tensor effect in the sponge... felt quite nice and seemed to enhance control.The bat face must be closed a little, and a forward movement is required, and this could produce fairly fast balls with decent sink...very effective. Even on more passive shots the ball did not grip as much as it does on many other grippy pip...
Chopping against loops: This rubber really shines here and offered excellent control. The grip felt really good and allowed me to manipulate the spin real well. The spin reversal was very good. I did find it a little fast, which is probably due to the 1.0mm sponge, whereas I'm used to 0.6mm. The 1.0mm makes it more dangerous but sacrifises some control. I could produce some vicious sidespin chop against a spinny loop...very dangerous.
Attacking and hitting: Well it surprised me a little here... it was amazingly good for hitting... a bit similar to Curl p2... felt more like a short pip in this respect...and the grip allowed you generate some topspin to keep it down. Again I felt that nice clicky feel that tensors give you. It can produce decent spin when you dig the ball into the sponge, but not much when you brush it more softly...this is a exactly what you want for good spin manipulation or deception.
In conclusion this is a very versatile rubber and does not have any real weaknesses, but with 1.0mm sponge it requires a bit more skill to master it, so it's more suitable for intermediate to high level players. It suits choppers more than close-to-the-table blockers, but it's excellent for attacking high balls to put them away.
1 comment:
Thanks, I'll have to try that out. Nice post.
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