Good Tennis Balls for Practice

Hi everyone. I have just begun my journey to getting more serious with my tennis game. I have been playing more extensively for the past 6 months, such as coaching, watching more Youtube videos, practicing solo, etc. In the beginning, I had purchased a ball hopper and ta bucket of Penn Pressureless balls and have been playing with my fiance and we've been improving together.

After reading through forums and articles, the consensus is that pressureless balls are really bad for your arm, bad to practice with (unless its with a ball machine), and does not replicate a pressured tennis ball. I've had my pressureless tennis balls for ~6 months and I think it's time to buy new ones. I'm looking for pressured balls with so many options and different brands, I don't know what's best for my situation.

I play on hard surface, I'd say I'm ~3.0 player, play about 4-6 times/week for 1-2 hours, and looking to purchase bulk (so about 36 balls). Eventually, all pressured tennis balls lose pressure but some last longer. I was thinking of purchasing Wilson Championship Extra Duty versus Penn Championship Extra Duty balls but I wanted to know what you all thought would be best. Also, do Pro tier balls last THAT much longer than tier 2 balls? Thanks in advance for you help!
 
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Deleted member 23235

Guest
some thoughts...
* definitely stay away from pressureless balls...too hard on my arm
* playing with slightly deader balls IMO is fine, and arguably better for you, since it'll move slower, and force you "swing out" more... just make sure you shape the ball well (topspin)
* premium balls always last the longest
 

JEDI MASTER

Professional
Go to Costco, buy a case of Penn (20 cans, 60 balls) for 36-38 bucks
the case at Costco are great for practice...sometime they go on sale for $29

but the best practice balls I've use the Pro-Penn..stays newer longer and hold their bounce for quite awhile... mine are 2 years old and still use them.
 

Bolt

Semi-Pro
Believe it or not, the no-name balls from Walmart perform well for a long period of time and if you buy the box of 12 cans the price can't be beat. The added benefit of no-name printed on the felt makes it easy to distinguish your balls from neighboring courts.
 

Bigfoot Fault

New User
You're not opening all the cans up at once are you? Is that what you're planning on doing?

If not, and you're just going to open them as needed like normal, my advice would be to just experiment. Buy a few cans of each brand available in your area and see what you like.

In my location, normal Penns were the best value/quality.
 
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You're not opening all the cans up at once are you? Is that what you're planning on doing?

If not, and you're just going to open them as needed like normal, my advice would be to just experiment. Buy a few cans of each brand available in your area and see what you like.

In my location, normal Penns were the best value/quality.

Yes actually I was going to open them all at the same time and cycle through every couple of months. I hate running after a few balls to play with. If I’m out to play tennis, I want to have enough balls where I can keep hitting for a long period of time.

At the moment, I’m using pressureless balls but the felt seems to be ripping away so I’m looking for a large stock of pressured balls to hit around with my fiancé.
 

Robert F

Hall of Fame
I've found Pro Penn Marathon Balls to last very well. When my buddy and I hit, we open one new can and use one can from our previous session (which runs between 2-3 hours). It is tough to tell the difference between the new and old balls. I found most other balls struggle to last as well after 2 hours of use compared to the Pro Penn Marathons. Wilson US Opens are a distant second for me. They play as good for the first 2 hours but are much different than a new can at that point.

With that in mind, if you buy a case, also buy a ball hopper. Next time you play, open 2 cans. 6 balls works well for most practices with a good hitting buddy. A good balance of hitting and rest. After your practice throw 3 balls in the hopper. Keep the other 3 balls for your next session and open one other can. Keep repeating adding 3 balls to your hopper after each session. Soon you'll have a full hopper that would be good for a feeding based practice, serve practice or self-feeding drills when you don't have a buddy.
 

Ruark

Professional
I keep balls in Ball Savers. Works great. I change them when the fuzz starts wearing down. I usually have 9 (3 Ball Savers) with me for practicing serves, etc.
 

chrisb

Professional
the tretorn micro X tennis balls are expensive but are usta approved because they technically have air trapped inside a foamy interior. They are slightly heavier, but lowering string tension a couple of lbs should take care of that. They provide a consistent bounce which is paramount for good practice I when hitting always open a new can of balls, use Coscto Penns, the are good for 11/2 hitting session, but don`t last long enough to be a good lesson ball imo
 

GatorAuthor

New User
The new Wilson Ultra All Court balls maintain pressure / playability a lot longer than the (previously) top of the line ProPenn and Wilson. I’m surprised at how much an improvement they are.
 

Robert F

Hall of Fame
I felt the Wilson Ultra All Court lost fuzz fast, did seem to retain their bounce but almost felt more like a racuqetball.
 
Why do people suggest using pressureless balls for ball machines? Does the machine not work well with pressured balls? I'm thinking of purchasing a ball machine to work on repetition because I don't have anyone that can feed me consistent shots.
 

Robert F

Hall of Fame
The advantage of pressureless balls is they will last longer, hence you won't have to change balls as much for the machine.
The disadvantage is that they can be tougher on the elbow and shoulder. If you use a ball machine intensely, you'll probably hit a lot more balls than you would hitting with a friend. Hence you'll have a lot more shock to your elbow/shoulder in a shorter period of time. So you need to be careful with pressureless balls or dead pressururized balls.

Some people's joints and tendons can take a beating with light racquets, poly strings, stiff racquets, dead pressurized balls fired out of a ball machine designed as a howitzer.
Other people can't handle a slight increase in string tension coupled with a ball that has been used for more than an hour hit to them by their newborn.

If you have never had joint/tendon issues consider the pressureless balls.
If you have joint/tendon issues, use pressured balls but make sure to change them out frequently.
 

lstewart

Semi-Pro
When my son was in juniors and high school, I was his coach and every day hitting partner. We did what someone else suggested. We would have a can of good balls, and would use them for 2 workouts for our actual playing. We had a ball hopper that had balls a little older, and would use it for drills the first part of the workout. After a couple of practices, the 3 good balls would go into the hopper, and I would open a new can. Once a week or so I would remove the oldest balls from the hopper. I ordered some Pro Penn's at times, and they were great. But generally I just used Penn Championship Heavy Duty.
 

stapletonj

Hall of Fame
The WalMart no name brand are terrible in my experience. I bought one can one time, hit with somebody using them one time.
decent conditions (no excessive cold, heat, rain, humidity, etc., on a hard court, not abrasive clay or the like) both times
None of the balls lasted even one hour of hitting.
They began to deteriorate almost immediately and were functionally useless in an hour (strands of fuzz hanging off the balls, fluffing up excessively).
Next time I saw the guy who tried them, he said they were flat the next day.

I am an old doubles specialist and play 3.5-4.0

These balls were designed for the person who goes to Wally World on a whim and buys the 4 cheapest rackets he can find and one can of the cheapest balls he can find
to take the kids to the local park and bat the ball around to try out this tennis thing after seeing an ad or part of a match on TV.
And it shows.

Pro Penn Marathon are significantly longer lasting than most of the major brands.....
 
Why are pressureless bad for arms? Are they heavier?
they are harder and send more shock down the arm, I hate them but some folk have no problem whatsoever and lucky them as they last much longer. Popular for ball machines but not in mine.
I just learned this lesson.
Been using gamma pressureless balls in my tennis tutor machine.
Have had intermittent elbow and shoulder pain over the years.
Just fed my last batch of new pressureless balls into my machine, and one of the wheels shredded after 80 throws.

So, not only could they be bad for the body, but also the machine. I would never have thought the wheels could go bad on a tennis machine with "soft" tennis balls. I did buy the tennis tutor as used years ago, so maybe 400+ hours total. But the harder balls may have done the wheel in.

It wasn't too bad to replace. Just a week wait and $60+$12 shipping for two wheels by sports tutor.

I'm going to do what was posted about using a corny keg as a ball saver, and buy some Penn championship balls. $2.25 per can still at Walmart. Costco is selling their case for $47 (20cans?), so not a better deal.
 
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