Racquet Playtest Comparison:

About the play tester

About the racquets

Name: Len Playing Level: 3.0 Regular racquet, string & tension: My current racquet is a (pre-2001) ProKennex Kinetic 5G. It is usually strung with Gosen Micro OG Sheep 17g, either alone or in a hybrid with Bow gut in the mains. I seem to play best with the 5G when it is strung at the lowest end of the recommended tension range. However, I have playing experience with more than a couple of dozen different racquets, the majority of which are in the player's category and are models frequently under discussion on the TW message boards. Also, because I string my own racquets I have some feel for the effects of different string types and tensions on individual frames. Tell us about your game: I am a 61 year old player who plays doubles at least four times a week on hard- surfaced courts, both indoors and out. My game is based upon placement and strategy, rather than raw power and is generally what I would describe as traditional serve-and volley style doubles. I use a compact to medium backswing with a semi-western grip for forehands and a continental grip for serves, volleys and (one-handed, primarily slice) backhands.

I purposely did not read any descriptions, specifications or reviews of these racquets prior to playing with them, in order to try to avoid preconceptions. I will report my impressions of the racquets' relative play characteristics on a low to high scale of 1 -10.]

Groundstrokes

Forehands

The Head and Babolat played similarly. I rated the Head higher because it gave me the solid, controlled, comfortable feeling of plowing through the ball, that I associate with a typical player's racquet. Even though the Head is 1.5 ounces lighter than my current racquet (based on my own measurements), it felt similar to the PK 5G. The Babolat provided a bit more pop than the Head, but gave me somewhat less control, particularly when I had to rush a shot. In those instances it was difficult for me to keep the ball in the court.

The Volkl was definitely in third place for me. I really disliked it. To begin with, it felt underpowered compared to the other two racquets. I felt that had to work much too hard to get my usual pace on the ball. In addition, I had a major problem with my timing while using it - my swing always seemed to be too early. This resulted in serious difficulties with ball control, which was a non-issue with the other two racquets. My dislike of the Volkl for forehand strokes went beyond the feeling that it was under-powered and swung too light. It also felt too stiff and harsh, i.e., kind of "tinny", even though it's handle incorporates one of Volkl's vibration control systems.

I suppose I expected my generally negative reaction to the Volkl on flat and topspin forehands to carry over to the other strokes. I was, therefore, that much more surprised to find that when I hit forehand slices, the Volkl out-performed the Head and Babolat (at least with regard to ball placement and the degree of spin).

TW's specs for the Tour 5 list its stiffness as "61". Although that may be correct, my perception when hitting forehands with the Tour 5 was that it felt like a racquet whose stiffness was closer to 70 than 61.

Backhands

Unexpectedly, I found the Volkl to just barely edge out the Head for first place in this category. The Volkl offered a level of precision, comfort and power that made it a pleasure to use to hit both flat and topspin backhands. The Babolat was not far behind.

Volleys

At the net, the Liquidmetal 4 was stable, comfortable, easy and quick to maneuver and offered an excellent combination of control and power. The Babolat trailed somewhat behind the Head. I found the Pure Drive to play well, although it was a bit more sluggish and gave me somewhat less control than the Head.

Hitting volleys with the Volkl was an unanticipated pleasure. I don't believe that I am exaggerating when I say it was more maneuverable than any racquet I have used previously. In addition, I considered it to be outstanding with regard to power and control. Strangely enough, I found it particularly comfortable on volleys, unlike my experience when hitting forehands with it.

Return of Serve

The Head gave me more confidence on service return than did the other two racquets. It provided a combination of maneuverability, solidity and control that allowed me to hit fairly aggressive returns without concerns about racquet position, insufficient racquet head mass to maintain control (Volkl) or over-hitting (Babolat).

Serves and Overheads

Serves

The Head Liquidmetal 4 provided an excellent combination of racquet head speed and feedback at contact with the ball. I was encouraged to swing hard and served well (for me).

The Babolat gave me a little more power than the Head and equally good feedback at contact with the ball, but I could not place my serves quite as accurately.

From my own observations and the comments of players receiving my serves, my serves were noticeably stronger with the Head and Babolat than with my PK 5G. I also found that I could generate a better kick with Head and Babolat than with my 5G. The Babolat and Head were very close to one another in generating spin.

The Volkl seemed to give me the fastest racquet head speed of the three. Contact with the ball did not feel quite as solid as when serving with the Head or Babolat, but was comfortable. Ball placement was as good as with the Babolat. The Volkl felt like it had the lowest swingweight of the three racquets and this characteristic permitted me to keep the racquet head speed at a relatively consistent level over the course of a match. Fatigue did not have as much of a negative effect on service speed with the Volkl as it did with the other racquets, which swung heavier.

Although I was not hitting as heavy a serve with the Volkl, I was able to generate more spin with it for topspin and slice serves, than with either of the other two racquets.

I believe that I had approximately the same degree of success in serving with the Head and the Volkl racquets. It is true that they have different playing characteristics, but the similar results may simply demonstrate that it is possible to reach the same end-point via different pathways.

Overheads

I tested the Head first. The overheads that I hit with it seemed noticeably more powerful and precise than with any racquet I had hit with before. However, when I subsequently used the Babolat, I felt the same way about it. I am hard-pressed to rate one better than the other for overheads. The Volkl did not perform quite as well for me as the other two. It may be that its lighter weight (or lower swingweight) had a more significant effect on hitting overheads than other racquet characteristics, especially when there is time to set up for the shot.

Stability

Off-Center Hits/Size of "Sweetspot"

Using a ball machine, I purposely hit off-center (near top, bottom and both lateral edges) in order to try to get a sense of the stability of each racquet on off-center hits and the size of its sweetspot. (I would have liked to determine whether there were noticeable differences in power and/or control between racquets when a ball was struck outside their sweetspot, but could not figure out a practical way to test for this.)

I found no apparent differences between the three racquets as far as stability on off-center hits. All three handled off-center hits well, without imposing noticeable torque on the handle. I did not feel that there would be anything to gain, for instance, by adding lead tape to the 3:00 and 9:00 positions of any of these racquets.

In this test category, I found insignificant differences between racquets for all strokes other than the forehand. My notes show that I assigned the following numerical values to the racquets, to indicate the size of the sweetspot (forehand only): Head............9.0 Babolat........8.3 Volkl...........7.5

The Head, in particular, distinguished itself because I found it to be much more forgiving than the other two racquets. I found the Babolat to be average and the Volkl to be decidedly the least user friendly of the three. .

Power

The Babolat had the most power, the Head was a close second and the Volkl was clearly third. These differences were most apparent to me on forehands.

Control

Racquet	FH topspin	FH flat	FH slice	FH drop shot	BH topspin & flat	BH slice	BH drop shot
Head	9.2	9.0	8.5	8.5	8.2	8.5	8.5
Babolat	7.7	8.0	7.5	8.5	7.9	7.5	8.5
Volkl	8.0	7.4	9.0	8.5	8.4	9.0	9.0

Comfort

Over the course of a typical game, I found the Head to be the most comfortable and the Volkl the least comfortable. If I were to base my evaluation on all strokes other than forehands, there would be no significant differences in comfort between the three racquets. I am not sure why that is the case, in that their respective weight, frame flex, balance point, string tension and anti-vibration technology all differ.

Concluding Remarks

After having enjoyed playing with The Volkl C10 Pro for some time, I feel a certain degree of brand loyalty to Volkl. Even given that the Tour 5 is not intended to be a clone or newer generation of the C10 Pro, I was really disappointed with it at first. It was only after I had more experience playing with it that I was able to appreciate it's many strong points. The quickness, precision, spin, power and control of the Volkl at the net would make it an easy first choice, if I were only playing net.

I cannot tell you why I found the Volkl to be so sub-par for forehands, but give such a good account of itself in the other stroke categories. I did wonder whether my finding of its poor performance on forehands reflected the racquets limitations or mine. This bothered me enough that, for what it is worth, I had three other players briefly hit groundstrokes with it (in rallies with me) in order to get an initial opinion from them. The 2.5 player (who plays with a light weight, oversize, very head-heavy tweener's racquet) said she didn't like the Volkl at all. When pressed for the reason, she said she didn't like the sound when the ball came off the strings. The 3.5 player (who plays with a moderate weight, moderately oversize, moderately head-heavy racquet didn't like it either, although she could not give me any specific explain her reasons. The 4.0 player (who uses a medium weight, midplus, evenly balanced racquet) liked it very much. He had no trouble adapting to it and found no deficiencies in its comfort, control or power (although he did prefer the Liquidmetal 4 over the other two racquets). It amazed me that he and I had such diametrically opposed opinions of the same racquet, when hitting the same balls, on the same court. I imagine that there is a lesson in this that may go beyond the difference in skill levels.

The Babolat had no outstanding faults, but then again I did not find it to offer more than a great many other racquets offer and I did not like that it felt sluggish at times. Perhaps if I were able to better control its inherent power I would feel differently about it. Or, it may be that my deficiencies in technique and conditioning have not let me appreciate its potential. Never-the-less, it is not my first choice..

The Head played heavier than I expected from its specs, which I consider to be a good thing. It did everything I asked of it well and I never felt that I had to alter my style to adjust to the racquet. I consider it to have given the best, most solid, all-around performance of the three that were tested and to out-perform most other racquets with which I have played. It was interesting to me that the racquets' specifications did not translate into the performance characteristics that I expected. For instance, all three racquets have 16x19 string patterns and the size of the squares made by the mains and crosses in the sweetspot area of the Volkl seem to be smaller, on the average, than those in the Babolat and Head, yet I was clearly generating more spin with the Volkl than with the other two racquets. (And the string tension in the Volkl was less than the tension in the other two.)

Another example of the difference between what I expected based on racquet specifications and what I actually found is racquet maneuverability as a function of balance point. I did not find a good correlation between the two. I measured the balance points of the racquets, as set up for play. I found the Head to be 1 pt. HL, the Babolat to be 8 pt. HL and the Volkl to be 3 pt. HL. (My PK 5G is 9 pt. HL.) As you can see from the scores in the summary table, my perceptions of maneuverability were not at all in keeping with the published specs. I am not able to provide the basis for the discrepancies.

I have not made any observations about differences in play characteristics based on differences in racquet length. The reason is that I have never really been able to detect a difference in performance based on a difference of one-quarter or one-half an inch in length. Likewise, I have never felt that I had to adapt in any way to differences in length when switching from one racquet another of a different length, even if I switched within the same set. Perhaps this is another reflection of the fact that I am only a 3.0 player. The following table summarizes my findings for the three racquets:

Racquet	FH	BH	BH Slice	Volleys	Serve	Power	Control	Topspin	Comfort	Maneuverability	Touch/Feel
Head	9.0	8.4	8.5	8.8	8.4	8.8	9.0	9.0	8.4	9.0	8.0
Babolat	8.5	8.0	7.5	8.0	7.9	9.1	8.0	7.8	8.2	8.0	7.6
Volkl	6.5	8.6	9.0	9.4	8.4	7.5	7.3	8.2	7.0	9.3	7.8

The order of my choice of racquets, based on this play test, is:

1. Head Liquidmetal 4
2. Volkl Tour 5 (with additional weight added)
3. Babolat Pure Drive

*Based upon my Stringmeter readings, the stringbed tensions of the Head and Babolat were in keeping with what I expected, based upon the manufacturers' specifications, and were similar. Although Volkl specifies a tension range for the Tour 5 that is similar to those of the other two racquets, Stringmeter readings for both mains and crosses were lower by an amount that I would consider significantly different from the Head and Babolat, even taking into account that the strings in each of the three racquets were different brands. I do not know whether the difference in string tension played any (or how much of a ) part in my perceptions of how the different racquets played.

Playtest date: December, 2004.

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