A personal feeling

Many times I find people in table tennis forums complaining on how different can be 2 blades that are supposed to be the same model. I have to agree with them, especially, when we are dealing with pure wood blades. Wood is a live material and as a result at source and over its life cycle can evolve differently depending on the environmental conditions. In the case of blades using composite materials they tend to be more similar.

In my personal experience, the main difference betweeen 2 blades of the same model, was based on its rigidity and crispness. Some times I bought a wonderful blade – to me a wonderful blade it is at the same time powerful and flexible but with the right touch of crispness – and then go for a second one to alternate both every time I have to replace my rubbers over the season. Oftenly this second blade dissapoints me a little bit as it is usually more rigid and with less feeling than the previous blade.

All that said, in the last times I managed to find a Xiom Novus series blade that really fits my needs at this stage. It worked so well to me that I decided to get a second one and, this time, to my surprise I got a second blade of the exact same batch. How do I know that? Simple, Xiom blades have a serial number marked at every blade, and my 2 blades have 2 consecutive numbers, in addition, they really look similar (weight, shape, exact thickness …). On this second blade, I applied a very light coat of varnish on each side and stuck thicker rubbers on it. Ok, these changes are sufficient to get a slight different feeling between both blades and, you are right, they feel different.

Nevertheless I decided to use my second blade the rest of the season, as the feeling was not that bad and I guessed that by using my second setup I would end up getting the same feeling on both. In fact, I can say that I was more or less right. I ended up with a setup that feels quite similar to my first racket (2 exact rackets are just not possible).

Up to this point, nothing surprising. However, making a deeper analysis I realized that there were 3 factors that led me to this result:

• By using a blade over time, it becomes, in the end, slightly more flexible. Some people say that it softens a bit as well (the water based glue certainly helps on this and this is one of the reasons why I protect my blades with a light coat of varnish).
• The handle feels different over time and allows grabbing the racket better. As a result I managed to take my racket more firmly. I do really think that grabbing the racket firmly – as a single piece – is a must to ensure sounding blade’s feedback.
• Changing my technique to focus on performing larger movements helped me to better feel the blade at the impact’s point.

This detail, about grabbing the racket firmly, really captured my attention as Chinese players are good examples of this. I think of people like Fan Zendhong, Ma Long or Zhang Jike, for instance, but also of older players like Ma Wenge or Liu Guozheng. All of them with typical long style strokes particularly on the forehand and a tendency to grab firmly their rackets.

As stated in the header of this blog’s entry, please, do not take it as technical tip but more as a personal feeling that I would want to share with you. It would be interesting to discover that some of you got the same experience or that you have other thoughts on this.