Today was the first time I played with no wrist pain in a month!!!

My friend was taking his daughter to tennis coaching and didn't have any balls with him.
I showed up and whacked one of his balls that he was serving and it felt a little strange like hitting air.
I picked up the ball and squeezed it and it was super soft an orange dot ball.

I've heard of these but have never played with one until today. I was ripping forehands like the previous month before my wrist TE / Sprain.
The balls do move slower and doesn't bounce as much as a regular ball,

are there any balls that are more similar to a regular ball but soft on impact like an orange dot?

I have both an orange dot and a green dot tennis ball in my bag for warming up my wrist, which has a TFCC injury and so hurts when I make bad contact. The orange dot is the intermediate junior ball, I think for 8 and 9 year old kids, and the green dot is for 10 years and older. The green dot bounces a bit higher and faster than the orange dot.

When I hit with my wife, we will always use the orange dot balls. They make a pretty satisfying "whack" sound too. The green dot is a little fast for her since she plays at most a couple of times a year, but still hits at near 3.5 level.

Sorry to hear about your injury: I have the opposite story as my two days old wrist pain got away after working out once with chest expander(elastic bands) and light weights....I guess I had neglected that.

the orange dot also seemed like a much lighter and softer ball. Are green dots lighter than a normal ball too?

junbun said:

the orange dot also seemed like a much lighter and softer ball. Are green dots lighter than a normal ball too?

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The orange dot and green dot balls were designed to get the ball into the proper hitting height for juniors but also specified to be lighter to accommodate the shorter and lighter racquets that juniors use. It's also allowed that orange dot and green dot balls can be smaller than a regular ball but the maximum sizes for all three are the same.

Orange dot balls can vary a lot more than green dot balls. Orange dot balls can weigh between 36 and 47 grams, while a green dot ball can weigh between 47 and 52 grams. A regular tennis ball is about 57 grams. What's always the most surprising to me is how it feels like you can't mis-hit with an orange dot ball. It's just a reminder how increasing the mass of the hoop on a racquet can really increase the sweetspot size.

Green dot balls are probably the sweetspot for adults who need a bit slower play but even they can bounce up pretty high with enough spin. My wife is 5'3" and because you have to loft a junior ball pretty high to get full court depth, a green dot still can bounce over her shoulder height with topspin. The orange dot ones bounce right into her hitting zone of about waist high.

Injured Again said:

What's always the most surprising to me is how it feels like you can't mis-hit with an orange dot ball. It's just a reminder how increasing the mass of the hoop on a racquet can really increase the sweetspot size.

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Yea it felt like I was hitting a ping pong ball lol. We would need to be able to swing a racquet that's almost twice as heavy to feel like we're hitting an orange dot.
Funny enough there was a time when 8oz super light racquets were peddled to consumers, i did hit with it once and every ball felt heavy and hard to control.

BTW what are the specs of your racquet/strings right now?

I'm using a 18x20 Wilson Ultra Tour, 350g, 340 SW, 32cm balance on gut/poly strung 52/48
I'm thinking about bumping the weight up to 370 in the handle. and stringing gut/velocity 55/52 in spring.

junbun said:

Yea it felt like I was hitting a ping pong ball lol. We would need to be able to swing a racquet that's almost twice as heavy to feel like we're hitting an orange dot.
Funny enough there was a time when 8oz super light racquets were peddled to consumers, i did hit with it once and every ball felt heavy and hard to control.

BTW what are the specs of your racquet/strings right now?

I'm using a 18x20 Wilson Ultra Tour, 350g, 340 SW, 32cm balance on gut/poly strung 52/48
I'm thinking about bumping the weight up to 370 in the handle. and stringing gut/velocity 55/52 in spring.

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Currently using SW104 at 351 grams and 345 swingweight with full bed of poly. Stringing the center eight mains at 50 +- 3 pounds and the center five mains at 45 +- 3 pounds, decreasing tension towards the edges, with tension depending on the stiffness of the string. I'm currently using Cyclone Tour 1.20 at 53/47, and would use 48/43 for 17 gauge Silver 7 Tour.

I'd prefer to be a little heavier with a little higher swingweight as that helps my offensive game but I need lighter for when I get put on hard defense. I'd probably want 355/350 for offense, and 340/335 for defense so my current setup is biased towards better offense at the expense of defense.

I was considering getting a radical tour OS to play with during this injury period. The specs are fairly close to your current racquet right now i think.

junbun said:

I was considering getting a radical tour OS to play with during this injury period. The specs are fairly close to your current racquet right now i think.

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Ouch. Is your injury serious enough to need switching to another racquet versus a softer stringbed?

I'm headed towards a larger racquet at some point in the near future. At age 59, it's getting harder every year to make good contact against young, hard hitting players and my wrist injury that started in November of last year was due to making bad contact too often when swinging hard. I think that by going larger, my ability to play defense will improve since the primary reason I miss shots is because I mis-hit, and hopefully that larger racquet will continue to let me play at my preferred spec rather than to go lighter.

Good luck and hope your wrist heals quickly.