PST with better feel - modding experiment

[Tranqville]

@Tranqville
I'll maintain that if you really want more feel in a 16-main control pattern 22+mm beam, you're best off with a G360+ Rad MP and/or Auxetic Extreme Tour.

Auxetic Radical comes in January, I believe. Could be another interesting option. @Trip, I guess Rad MP would have better feel but ET would play closer to PST?

 

[Tranqville]

unfortunatly my wrist collapsed after 10 minutes of play with pure aero vs and isospeed black fire...

Pure Aero VS has 154 HZ vibration frequency, maybe that's the reason. Definitely too much for me.

 

[Trip]

@Tranqville - Yes, the Auxetic Rad MP could be very well worth waiting for. As for better feel of the Rad MP vs ET, I would say the jury is out on that -- the Rad would probably have slightly better feel from the slightly narrower beam and more concentrated sweet spot, but not by much. They both channel a decent amount of string bed feel straight to the handle, with little in the way of dampening.

If you don't mind the direct sales model for now (ie. outside of TW), another frame to keep your eye on is the just-released Furi Arma Pro 98 (link). A quick look at the specs and initial feedback seems to indicate it could be very relevant to what you're looking for: 98", 16x19, 8-throat main medium control/spin pattern, 22.5-24mm continuously variable beam (shout-out to Prince!), 31+cm unstrung / 32+cm strung balance, a listed 64RA that from initial feedback seems to play more like a 66-67 (more ProStaff/Pure Strike like), an upper 290's / 300-ish unstrung swing weight (so probably upper 320's-330+ strung swing weight).

All their faults aside (snail's pace narration, inaccurate specs, bland/non-descript verbal reviews, etc.), Tennis Spin just reviewed it very favorably, including coach Gu who went out of his way to mention incredible feel:

Note - it seems they got a high-spec sample of the AP98, so I would take the slightly high SW and head-heavier balance in context for now...

I'd say it's definitely worth bookmarking that frame for further observation, at the very least.

 

[tomkowy]

Auxetic Radical comes in January, I believe. Could be another interesting option. @Trip, I guess Rad MP would have better feel but ET would play closer to PST?

I haven't played with Pure Strike Tour, only with regular Pure Strike 16x19. I'd say 360+ Radical MP is closer to regular Pure Strike. 360+ Extreme Tour feels a little bit softer and more spin friendly. Overall they are similar and switching between them was easy for me. Which has better feel is purely subjective in my opinion. For touch shots I preferred Radical (volleys, slices, dropshots) but Extreme Tour is easier to create angles from the baseline and better for second serves. Radical reminded me a lot of Liquidmetal Radical MP that I was using for years - nor soft, nor stiff, not much dwell/ flex and very predictable stringbed.

 

[ZeroandOne]

Any conclusion here @Tranqville ? Did you weigh up a radical mp?

 

[Tranqville]

I choose the new Technifibre ISO 315 with 5g added at 12, works well for me. Of course, I could not recreate the plough and control of PST, but overall achieved comfort and stability I wanted, a lot of spin. Got similar beam design and thickness, weight, same balance, but racquets play differenty. I still think weighted up Radical MP is the way to go.

 

[ZeroandOne]

Cool. Thanks for the update. I'm slugging around with the PST's but I'm just not good enough yet to wield it for an entire match. Might try some thin guage strings to lower the swingweight. Would extra tailweight help with maneuverability? Mine came unstrung 317.

 

[Tranqville]

Cool. Thanks for the update. I'm slugging around with the PST's but I'm just not good enough yet to wield it for an entire match. Might try some thin guage strings to lower the swingweight. Would extra tailweight help with maneuverability? Mine came unstrung 317.

PST is not a maneuvrable racquet and not much can be done about it with tailweigth or thin strings. You need a lot of core power to get that beast moving. I'm one of the big hitters on my level, but I still find my power and core strenght lacking, to be honest, and that's why i swithed to a lighter setup.

 

[ZeroandOne]

PST is not a maneuvrable racquet and not much can be done about it with tailweigth or thin strings. You need a lot of core power to get that beast moving. I'm one of the big hitters on my level, but I still find my power and core strenght lacking, to be honest, and that's why i swithed to a lighter setup.

That's what I thought, I guess I should do some bodyweight exercises then.

 

[Titochop77]

You should try the furi arma pro 98