Thoughts on the Wilson BLX Blade Tour?
- Thread starter shaneno
- Start date
UCSF2012
Hall of Fame
Sick racket.
Dense 18x20 = Precise placement. Steady tennis. On groundies, I get the same spin. Balls jump just as much. (With the Blade Tour, topspin groundies jump FORWARD, but with the 90 topspin jumps UP.) But on serves I get less spin, and the kickers don't jump as high. Can't explain why.
Upper half of the string bed isn't dead like the 90. This means faster serves. Reach shots (passing shots on the run) don't dump into the net.
Tons of top juniors using the Blade, but none really using the 90. I have a BLX Blade Tour in my tennis bag, but I retired the 90. The 90 is a useless racket compared to the many other frame out there.
shaneno
Professional
I have to disagree about the 90. I whipped tons of people butts with my 90. Excellent racket. Just it not right for some people
UCSF2012
Hall of Fame
Go ahead and disagree. I was in your camp once upon a time, since I've used the PS85 since the mid 90's and have used the n90, K90, and BLX90 up until last year, when I gave the BLX Blade Tour a serious consideration. Now, I have all my 90's (all 14 of them) stored away in the closet. While the 90 has many strengths, it has several abysmal deficiencies.
The Blade Tour has one setback, the kick serve doesn't kick.
The 90 has several setbacks. Serves (I can't break 110 with the 90, but I'm routinely at 125 for Blade Tour). Dead upper hoop = dead passing shots, bad shots at full stretch, etc....
The Blade Tour has one setback, the kick serve doesn't kick.
The 90 has several setbacks. Serves (I can't break 110 with the 90, but I'm routinely at 125 for Blade Tour). Dead upper hoop = dead passing shots, bad shots at full stretch, etc....
Say Chi Sin Lo
G.O.A.T.
It ain't the racquet, tons of people kick with 18x20 patterns.
shaneno
Professional
Wow really? i play with the PS90,n90,k90,Blx90, and BLX PS 90... and i hope your right.. i'm going try the blade out soon. Do u know if the new blades that coming out 2013. is the 93 coming out in 16X19
UCSF2012
Hall of Fame
As amazing of a racket the Blade Tour is, it's still not my main racket. There are more complete rackets out there. Just be forewarned, the Blade Tour is somewhat string sensitive. I didn't like it with full syn gut. (I thought it was a terrible racket, initially because of it) I love it with gut/poly and a bit of lead at 3/9. It's very steady and very precise with 16g gut\poly. With 17g gut\poly, it really digs in and generate spin, with little loss of precision (since it's a dense 18x20 to begin with).
The lack of the PWS makes the stringbed more even. IE, the upper hoop isn't dead.
The lack of the PWS makes the stringbed more even. IE, the upper hoop isn't dead.
shaneno
Professional
Really? Full Syn gut is bad no matter what. feel so bad to me. how string sensitive we talking about rate from 1-10, 1 being least and 10 being very very high
UCSF2012
Hall of Fame
Actually, I take it back. Probably wasn't string-sensitive as...first time around, I strung it too tightly with regular synthetic gut. I didn't get much pop, and I couldn't get it to do too much. When I changed to gut/poly, it was a different story. I've only tried 3 strings combo's, syn gut, gut/poly, and poly/multi. The last two were good.
You may have to try several string types/tensions before you find your magic.
stronzzi70
Professional
great stick, the secret is soft full poly and low tension, still have one .....really like it, heavy balls.....amazing for flat serve , nice for volleys...
I play with one sometimes and I like it too. My regular racket is a TF 325 and the Blade has a very similar weight and string pattern. it is a little more dead-feeling, but I can hit a good ball with it. I preferred it to the Blade 98, but I wouldn't mind picking one of those up used (I did demo it a few months ago).
Similar threads
- tennisfanireland94
- Racquets