Bonjour from Babolat

[Babolat Official]

Originally Posted by BigBanger007

Defo going to. I thought the earlier version was a beast especially on serves and I was surprised being able to find good angles on both sides during a doubles tournament match. But it was strung with solinco tour bite and my shoulder was screaming after the match adrenaline left. Hopefully there are soft poly's out there that I could get used to with this racquet. And thank you for the reply

Have fun out there. If you aren't breaking your strings every 8-14 hours, you might want to try a hybrid. Much easier on the body. Have fun out there!

[Babolat Official]

Originally Posted by Boricua

Can you explain the difference between RPM Dual and RPM Blast in terms of softness, power level, tension maintenance and spin? Thanks.

In October, I had two racquets strung up exactly the same (48 lbs in new APD) with RPM Blast and RPM Dual 16 (only gauge we had in office).

RPM Blast had more power & more spin but seemed less durable and lost tension quicker (played about 15 hours, didn't break but deep grooves at burn point).

RPM Dual felt stiffer but held tension better and did not break.

I will be sticking with RPM Blast until I can test the 17.

That said, one of the guys in the office who played at USC (Trojans) preferred the Dual...but he prefers Pro Hurricane Tour over RPM Blast.

Our master stinger in the office did a test where he strung two Pure Storm Limiteds, one with RPM Blast and one with RPM Dual. He let them sit for a week and using his "Beers ERT" he found the DT (dynamic tension?) dropped 4.5% on Dual and 9.1% on Blast. The caveat is this was one test and not part of the official Babolat lab...but we're tennis junkies so we wanted to see what would happen.

Hope that helps.

[Babolat Official]

Originally Posted by zapvor

i have to agree with this. i think more money should go into product quality and less on marketing dollars

I'll forward your comments on to the team in France.

[Boricua]

Originally Posted by BigBanger007

Defo going to. I thought the earlier version was a beast especially on serves and I was surprised being able to find good angles on both sides during a doubles tournament match. But it was strung with solinco tour bite and my shoulder was screaming after the match adrenaline left. Hopefully there are soft poly's out there that I could get used to with this racquet. And thank you for the reply

Polyfibre TCS is a good string for the APD. The softest there is but string weekly if you play at least three times a week.

[db379]

Originally Posted by boeitmeniks

Guys read my review on dual and apd 13 on this board, racquet form!

you and Daniel are going to be best friends

[Boricua]

Originally Posted by boeitmeniks

But Daniel, will RPM Dual be in 18 gauge and please try 17 gauge, i had a test again, dual 17 and blast 17 both at 53 lbs in APD 2013! I really think dual is softer, more power and spin and even control!

Remenber he uses full poly and you use gut/poly.

[Babolat Official]

Originally Posted by boeitmeniks

Really daniel
I thought it was softer, had more power and spin
Huh
I did play with 17 gage though with VS Team and VS Touch, will there be a 18 gauge, that would be yummy!

Different strokes for different folks. I won't be switching to it but some people like it.

[Babolat Official]

Originally Posted by boeitmeniks

But Daniel, will RPM Dual be in 18 gauge and please try 17 gauge, i had a test again, dual 17 and blast 17 both at 53 lbs in APD 2013! I really think dual is softer, more power and spin and even control!

I tried the 16. Will try the 17 when we get in the US office.

RPM Dual only comes in 16 & 17 for 2013.

[Babolat Official]

Originally Posted by boeitmeniks

Shame! Any plans for new colours. Full black!
I love RPM Dual 17, I'm an open player, I live in NL and am Belgian. I have a serve clocked at 120 mph, my best, a double handed backhand, a semi-western grip forehand and play a lot of slice and s&a as well as attacking baseliner. I love playing grinders because then I attack the net.

No new colors planned for 2013. Glad you like the product. Stay aggressive out there.

[tistrapukcipeht]

Interesting thread.

I find very funny people saying about the quality of their racquets, saying to invest money in product quality/quality control, more flexible racquets, more arm friendly, but at the end to me it's the most stupid thing I hear, you know why??

1- Babolat isn't forcing you (complainers) to buy their crappy racquets.

2- Babolat is still the best selling racquets as many have pointed out, so why would they try to fix something isn't broken, in other words, why would they make changes in their racquets if they are still best seller, I guess people like it, right?

If you don't like their racquets, and I don't really care about it, buy something else, I hope they continue to make the same racquets with different paint and the idiots keep buying their cheap low quality racquets, if you want to play with their racquets it's your choice, suck it up, don't complain.

As long as Nadal keep playing with it, they will sell millions of horrible racquets to Nadal kids.

[Winners or Errors]

I just don't buy the "Babolat makes junk" line. My team is all old guys. They almost all play Babolat. No one has arm problems, and they aren't playing Pure Storms. They're all playing APDs or Pure Drives.

There is a reason Babolat is #1 right now. I don't play with them, but I'm tempted to try. Right now, I'm just too used to softer flexes and smaller heads, but if someone gave me a couple of Babolats to try I'd probably give it a shot and try to find a tension/string that'd work. They are pretty tempting.

By the way, no one on my team complains about quality either.

[Babolat Official]

Originally Posted by tistrapukcipeht

Interesting thread.

I find very funny people saying about the quality of their racquets, saying to invest money in product quality/quality control, more flexible racquets, more arm friendly, but at the end to me it's the most stupid thing I hear, you know why??

1- Babolat isn't forcing you (complainers) to buy their crappy racquets.

2- Babolat is still the best selling racquets as many have pointed out, so why would they try to fix something isn't broken, in other words, why would they make changes in their racquets if they are still best seller, I guess people like it, right?

If you don't like their racquets, and I don't really care about it, buy something else, I hope they continue to make the same racquets with different paint and the idiots keep buying their cheap low quality racquets, if you want to play with their racquets it's your choice, suck it up, don't complain.

As long as Nadal keep playing with it, they will sell millions of horrible racquets to Nadal kids.

I take it you're not a fan of our brand. Totally fine...but let's keep this thread to questions, discussion, and information (if you don't mind). There are plenty of other threads pontificating on Babolat's evil and reckless motivations.

Happy hitting,

Daniel

[Rock Strongo]

Daniel, since I can't sleep anyway and I'm reading this thread, how did the doubles go yesterday?

[v-verb]

Originally Posted by Babolat Official

I take it you're not a fan of our brand. Totally fine...but let's keep this thread to questions, discussion, and information (if you don't mind). There are plenty of other threads pontificating on Babolat's evil and reckless motivations.

Happy hitting,

Daniel

I play old Prince POGs and Borons. I have a Babolat Pure Drive and it's an excellent racquet, quite an eye opener really.

For some odd reason I like my oldies better but seriously Babolat makes an excellent product - no need to down talk them.

I do use Babolat RPM Team 17 in my racquets, strung in the 40 lb range. I really like the string and am looking forward to trying the RPM Dual

[Fuji]

Originally Posted by tistrapukcipeht

Interesting thread.

I find very funny people saying about the quality of their racquets, saying to invest money in product quality/quality control, more flexible racquets, more arm friendly, but at the end to me it's the most stupid thing I hear, you know why??

1- Babolat isn't forcing you (complainers) to buy their crappy racquets.

2- Babolat is still the best selling racquets as many have pointed out, so why would they try to fix something isn't broken, in other words, why would they make changes in their racquets if they are still best seller, I guess people like it, right?

If you don't like their racquets, and I don't really care about it, buy something else, I hope they continue to make the same racquets with different paint and the idiots keep buying their cheap low quality racquets, if you want to play with their racquets it's your choice, suck it up, don't complain.

As long as Nadal keep playing with it, they will sell millions of horrible racquets to Nadal kids.

Exactly what's wrong the Aeropro Drive? You seem to have a real dislike for it.

-Fuji

[Bartelby]

Is there any Babolat research on how the woofer system works when a racquet is strung at:

a) 35 pounds

b) 55 pounds

[Boricua]

Originally Posted by Babolat Official

I take it you're not a fan of our brand. Totally fine...but let's keep this thread to questions, discussion, and information (if you don't mind). There are plenty of other threads pontificating on Babolat's evil and reckless motivations.

Happy hitting,

Daniel

I agree. And by the way I am trading in my two Vcore 97 for two 2013 APDs.

[tistrapukcipeht]

Originally Posted by Babolat Official

I take it you're not a fan of our brand. Totally fine...but let's keep this thread to questions, discussion, and information (if you don't mind). There are plenty of other threads pontificating on Babolat's evil and reckless motivations.

Happy hitting,

Daniel

I don't really care about Babolat racquets, though I have only tried the Aeropro drive, the older one, earlier version of this 2013 one and the pure drive 2012, after I demoed I pretty much erased Babolat racquets off my list.

Strings are very good, I used Pro Hurricane Tour, then Babolat RPM Blast for a good time, had always used VS Touch in hybrids, this winter I'm going to Wilson, since most don't like the new BT7, and say the Wilson is the older VS, so obviously I have experienced Babolat products before, but I can admit after I joined this forum I learned and heard many things, that also lead me to dislike Babolat more, apart of me not liking the racquets first and foremost, I don't care what people use, but to me it's low quality, at least compared to the ones I use, so good luck to you and the thread.

Originally Posted by Fuji

Exactly what's wrong the Aeropro Drive? You seem to have a real dislike for it.

-Fuji

As far as playing, in my opinion here is what i found:

- with the same stiffness as my current racquet it is a hell lot stiffer than mine.

- having the same weight as my current racquet, it is very unstable, vibrates a lot, unlike the racquet I use.

- It feels hollow and lacks accuracy when compared to my racquet.

- grip is horrible (but this is personal preference), so i'd never play with racquet because of the grip shape nor the throat design, it just feels really weird too.

As far as quality, Drakulie can give you an entire list of problems.

Anyway, I was actually defending Babolat towards the ones who complain about it, obviously I'm not complaining about it because Babolat makes no difference to me, I don't spend anything on their products anymore.

[mrmo1115]

Originally Posted by Babolat Official

The advantage of putting VS in the mains is increased power and feel, but you lose durability and spin. For every advantage, there is a drawback (my go to phrase)

I have tried the reverse hybrid (but with RPM 17 & VS 16) in the 2010 APD and an AeroStorm. I was not a fan in the APD, but then again I didn't like a normal hybrid in it either (prefer all poly).

With the Aerostorm, I liked the traditional hybrid, but didn't find enough spin with the reverse. Candidly, I did not toy around with it past two string jobs. Maybe I could have found something by messing with the tensions/gauges more. I did play with a traditional hybrid in the AS for 8 months.

As far as cutting strings out...I'm pretty particular about tension. I play with very thin gauges because I want the string to break before it loses more than 30% of tension (problem with all poly set up). Even when I did not get string for free, I rarely played with a string job for more than 20 hours. Either it broke or I cut it out. I would string my own and for how much I love tennis, figured it was worth the feel.

If you never break strings and want to try the reverse...you're really only using one string job. And as someone who is always wondering if something will help my game more, it will stick in your head the more you don't try it and the more you read about it online.

One thing to remember when hybriding: Gut holds tension really well, poly does not. Some people want the bed the same tension and adjust their string tension accordingly, some want the mains/crosses to play at different tensions.

What is your current string tension, racquet head size, and string pattern?

Perhaps not my most eloquent response. Let me know if you have any other questions or want to bounce some ideas around.

Thanks for your response Daniel! I really appreciate your opinion
My current tension is 56 mains 58 crosses (PHT/VS)
I've bounced around from as high as 57/59 to as low as 55/57... nothing significantly different from my current tension! I believe I used to have a 3 pound differential at one time with my mains and crosses... so I had tensions of 55/58 and 56/59 before.
My racquet is the Pure Storm Tour GT and its 98 sq and 16x20!

[v-verb]

Originally Posted by tistrapukcipeht

I don't really care about Babolat racquets, though I have only tried the Aeropro drive, the older one, earlier version of this 2013 one and the pure drive 2012, after I demoed I pretty much erased Babolat racquets off my list.

Strings are very good, I used Pro Hurricane Tour, then Babolat RPM Blast for a good time, had always used VS Touch in hybrids, this winter I'm going to Wilson, since most don't like the new BT7, and say the Wilson is the older VS, so obviously I have experienced Babolat products before, but I can admit after I joined this forum I learned and heard many things, that also lead me to dislike Babolat more, apart of me not liking the racquets first and foremost, I don't care what people use, but to me it's low quality, at least compared to the ones I use, so good luck to you and the thread.


As far as playing, in my opinion here is what i found:

- with the same stiffness as my current racquet it is a hell lot stiffer than mine.

- having the same weight as my current racquet, it is very unstable, vibrates a lot, unlike the racquet I use.

- It feels hollow and lacks accuracy when compared to my racquet.

- grip is horrible (but this is personal preference), so i'd never play with racquet because of the grip shape nor the throat design, it just feels really weird too.

As far as quality, Drakulie can give you an entire list of problems.

Anyway, I was actually defending Babolat towards the ones who complain about it, obviously I'm not complaining about it because Babolat makes no difference to me, I don't spend anything on their products anymore.

Shows how different racquets appeal to different people. I see you use Yonex racquets from your sig.

The best thing I can say about the several Yonex's I've tried is that I find them unplayable. You like them as do many others so that's great. You won't find me on a Yonex thread outlining my unfavorable experiences.

This is a thread started by a Babolat rep giving people who use and are curious about Babolats a chance to discuss and get info about Babolats.

Although I don't use Babolats and will sell the one I own soon, I think it's commendable of Babolat to have this avenue of communication.