Well, tonight I played again against a local active tournament player. He had just come back from playing an open tournament in Brazil - I think he said it was at Iguazu. I’m not sure that I understood him well - he either placed fourth, or reached the fourth round.
Anyway, the first time I played him, about a month ago, I received a thorough beatdown. This guy has the best clay-court forehand I have ever played against. He hits with more racquethead speed than anyone I have ever played against bar none. And when he has time to wind up for his Rafa-esque fearhand, he never misses, as in maybe only 1 or 2 errors per match. But his forehand is one-dimensional. He can’t hit it on clay on the rise. And while he has pretty good dropshor touch, his backhand and net game are ordinary. The first match, I lost 6-2, 6-1. The 3 games I won that first match were when I served-and-volleyed to take advantage of his deep Rafa-style return position. But I couldn’t win any of his service games because his forehand was just too good, and he could go corner to corner on me until I finally hit one too short that he can put away.
Tonight, I went with the Juice Pro, still strung with 65 lbs 15g Wilson syn gut, with some weight on sides of hoop to bring swingweight up around 370.
I played a lot better this time with the Juicee . Groundstrokes felt good on both sides. Even my forehand was serviceable, with the controlled launch angle of the syn gut stringjob giving me confidence, and plenty of spin available due to the extra length and boosted twisteright.
Volleys were pretty good too. I got rare break in the 3rd game, and we each held the next 6 games. But I couldn’t sustain my level long enough to close out the set, and after leading 5-3, I got broken with a bad game at 5-4. Down 5-6, I brain-farted and switched racquets to drop the set 7-5. I switched back to the Juice and promptly held two more times before our court time expired at 2-2. I was very pleased with my competitive performance, despite my mental lapse and inability to close.
I was not serving great, but still somehow holding serve well with the Juice even when I missed my first serve and had to roll my second in. The stringjob made placing my serve easier than with spin strings. The swingweight felt a bit heavy for my serve (probably because my shoulder is getting old and weaker, as 370 used to be no prob a few years ago). But the ball response felt great at this swingweight. I’m thinking I need to serve some buckets of balls to get more used to it, as all my other shots were on. Either that or drop a couple of grams off the head.
This is a completely different type of racquet than I’m used to, but it seems to give me great results in competition. I think the tight locked stringjob and dense pattern just seems to pair so well with the extended length.
I’m rolling with the Juice.
