Best hybrid for serve & volley

[gafro2008]

This is great stuff Stefano. I am really a novice when it comes to understanding stringing and equipment. It is something I am trying to learn to advance my game.

When you were talking about Rafter's setup being more polarized, did you mean his racquet was head heavy or head light? From your explaination about putting lead tape on the butt cap it sounds like you mean head light, but I want to make sure.

[Stefano]

Originally Posted by grip

Stefano,

Your English is perfect, it is my brain that is slow, unfortunately. Thanks again for your explanation.

You're most welcome. Just ask if you need anything more

[gafro2008]

Newver mind my last post. I re-read your other post and now I think I understand where the lead tape is supposed to go.

[Stefano]

Originally Posted by gafro2008

This is great stuff Stefano. I am really a novice when it comes to understanding stringing and equipment. It is something I am trying to learn to advance my game.

Thank you gafro. Look, I have been doing this for the last 23 years and I am still learning every day. When I started, there were 5-6 - maybe 10 - brands of strings, no poly, no hybrids, none.

I remember I had some players I was stringing for - kids rated B in Italy, which was like 6-6.5 today - and they were very very happy to play with a gauge 15 (1.40mm) crappy nylon string because it was suiting their game perfectly and didn't break as much as natural gut would. They were happy to have a string breaking in 40-45 minutes ahahaha

In that period, the players rated A in Italy were Omar Camporese (he was n. 18 in the world in 1992), Paolo Cane' (n.26 in 1989), Andrea Gaudenzi (n. 18 in 1995) and so forth. This gives you the measure of which kind of strings they were playing with.

Now you don't even put that kind of string on a 19" junior racquet

Now there are nearly 500 different kinds of strings or maybe more. A real mess

So don't worry, make experiments and you'll get there. Guaranteed!

When you were talking about Rafter's setup being more polarized, did you mean his racquet was head heavy or head light? From your explaination about putting lead tape on the butt cap it sounds like you mean head light, but I want to make sure.

I was talking the other day with a guy here in Melbourne. He's Italian, but he spent all of his life here. His name is Lou and he has been the stringer and customiser for Pat Rafter through all his career (there's a lot to learn from him, trust me).

He was telling me that Rafter used to play with lead tape at 12, the same amount under the butt cap and high string tension, full Babolat VS Natural Gut at 69 lbs. Which is wierd. That racquet was far from being powerful, but he was powerful on his own and he just needed kick and control on volleys.

A set up I would never suggest, not even to my worst enemy LOL