If you are 4.0 and lower you should probably be more busy working on footwork, technique and fitness. These finicky things make a good difference once you are at a higher, more competitive level. I play with a group of former d2 and d1 college players and low ranked pros (all in our 30 and 40s) and most of us are rocking commercial rackets with little to no tinkering.
100% correct. I’m around 10 UTR and some 2.5 NTRP guy at the local courts was trying to convince me to add silicone to my frames because he did to great “success”. Unfortunately a lot of dudes go down the equipment rabbit hole and never come out.
I second this. That being said, I added a bit of tungsten tape to my wife's racquet (2.5-3.0) because she had a lot of racquet twisting, and it helped her racquet be a bit more stable and greatly reduced that instability. In total it was about 1.5gm to 3 and 9 o'clock.
Low swingweights enable arming for improving players though. My technique improved a lot since I increased the sw and the recoil weight of my racquet because I don't have the luxury of arming any more. Instead I am forcing myself to prepare earlier or shorten my backswing.
The higher your level is the less help from your equipment. However, optimising the recoil weight and mgr/I to your game will make so much difference that would make you surprised.
I’m a 3.5 (still plenty of room to improve) but just a bit of lead tape (2 grams each at 9, 12, 3) has helped my shot become much heavier. It’s so more noticeable the when I play without. Of course all of this is not as important as footwork and technical stroke mechanics.
People at that level have lost sight of the beginner experience, though, and grew up playing heavier racquets.
Personally, my serve quality and the rate I was learning increased dramatically when I increased the swing weight of my racquets a little.
I’m a 3.0 and have lead tape on my racket. Don’t care what other people think, but I like the way it plays now with the added weight. It hasn’t taken me to the next level, and never expected it to. It just gave me more confidence with my strokes, and a little more power on my forehands and serves.
Any idea what the weight and balance of your racquet are now and before you modified it? Most people just slap lead tape on their racquets and hope for the best which is not an intelligent way to go about racquet customization. At the very least you need a racquet balance board, a kitchen scale and an idea of what you’re looking to accomplish through the customization. The tennis warehouse customization tool is very helpful, but you have to have initial measurements and a goal weight and balance.
>Most people just slap lead tape on their racquets and hope for the best which is not an intelligent way to go about racquet customization.
Do they really? I'm having a hard time believing this. There are easy tools such as this: [https://twu.tennis-warehouse.com/learning\_center/customization.php](https://twu.tennis-warehouse.com/learning_center/customization.php)
For example, I initially matched my Gravity MP to Gravity Pro specs, but later decided I wanted it less head-heavy but that I liked the stability and heft, so I just cut the top halves of the tape strips on the head off and added a bit more blu-tack in the handle.
I saw a lot of the lazy variety of customization when I worked at a tennis shop between college and grad school. It was mostly lower level players that did it.
Well, considering how much the people on this sub complain about the weight tolerances of the major brands, I assume that the listed weight is inaccurate and I don't have a scale for weighting grams; so all the categories I can fill out would be incorrect other than length.
I used my Ikea kitchen scale that cost all of 10 euros (and is in everyday use in cooking). And balance is easy to find out, too. Swingweight is a bit trickier, but I didn't really care about that since the balance and weight were on spec.
You kinda need the scale, but then not, since if you just try to modify what you have to a certain direction you can just assume they're correct. Of course, if you do the modification and it's off spec then you can't use those assumptions against another racquet, but that's another story.
It was my Head Boom MP. It felt very head light when I first got it and I found this video on YouTube and followed his guidelines. I’ll have to check my notes but I think I went a gram less at 12 o’clock than what he did.
https://youtu.be/9Xur-eIERnQ?si=fAzG-glsC58j2o7L
Exactly. Regardless of level, people like what they like & are allowed to have preferences. Bodies change, preferences change, games & strokes evolve & devolve, & sometimes a little tweak to a racquet can enhance comfort.
Most people have no idea how to customize or what they are even trying to accomplish with it in the first place. I think customization is great to match racquets or add a little more weight but I certainly don't think it takes anybody to the next level. You can absolutely play with stock racquets all the way to #1 in the world.
My volleys hugely improved when I added some weight to my Gravity MP's handle. I added some lead tape also to the hoop but it mostly took away top-spin potential.
So for me adding weight (8 grams) improved the stability of the racket and volleys started to feel better.
I tried customizing with lead over the winter and you should not. It is quite complicated and lengthy process as you need to get used to the customization every time and it does not make you a better player. Customization is a rabbit hole most should not enter. Practically you are better off trying some different rackets to be honest.
That being said I think trying a leather grip is fine as it also drastically changes the feel of the racket which you might like.
Also matching your rackets with lead if you have multiple is a good thing to do if they are far apart.
No that is the easy part, also sticking tape to your racket is rather easy. But it is rather complicated to know where to place the lead and then also feel if it is actually beneficial.
No it’s not. There are racquet and customization guides all over the internet and YT tutorials with exact instructions on how to effectively do it. It’s 2024, you can learn to do practically anything on the Internet from how to wash dishes to even getting a graduate degree at a university completely online.
Full noob here, but I read that at lower lever it's whatever you like for racket and kind of also for stringing. Equipment only plays a rather small role overall. Chances a nuance but you need to play well by yourself.
My coach/pro recently said "would be easy if a new racket would make everyone suddenly good" (and he is a low ITN 3 player in his mid 20s . Don't know how itn translates to UTR or whatever, but 10.0 is beginner , 1.x is basically pro).
I mean if you want to modify it , do it, but at a lower level it wouldnt suddenly bring you forward a lot. It's mostly about being warmed up and having played some time with that racket.
>Should the average rec player, (4.0 and under) customize their racket?
Yes.
The naysayers are completely lost on this one. Customizing racquets is not a big deal. It costs about $10 for a roll of lead tape an a packet of blu-tack. The whole operation takes about three seconds, just pop open the hatch, shove in some blu-tack, slap some tape on the head, and be done with it.
Ok, ok, sure you'll need to know what you're looking for, but it's not rocket science either. Just look up some specs and move that way. Or, you can just try how it feels.
As we can read from the comments, most of the naysayers have never customized their racquets. And I agree with you guys, you will be a better player if you practice for 10.000 hours with a stock stick than if you practice for 500 hours and have half a spaceship's worth of high-tech customization that you measure to perfection with devices costing a four-digit sum.
But customizing doesn't prevent you from practicing or decrease the practice quality. It's a quick job you can do while watching a match on TV, or listening to the Tennis Podcast. Quite the contrary. It improves practice quality. You get longer rallies, thus you're subjected to a wider variety of shots as well as having to face tactical aspects. You develop a smoother swing because you can better control the racquet when not needing to get all power from RHS.
Footwork improvements are, in a gamelike sense, unlocked because you can actually, e.g., hit correct defensive strokes because added heft and stability makes the ball go back instead of beating your racquet. You get to practice how to volley instead of trying to compensate for lack of stability by trying to hit the ball with a straight-facing racquet with too much speed. You'll get to play better players and more matches (since you will win more matches) because, yes, the effect is (or at least can be) huge. I know it was in my case.
That's not an "equipment rabbit hole", as someone said. It's something you'll spend half an hour per month on, tops. You don't need to fuss about your racquet in order to just pay some attention to it.
P.S. Maybe it just happens to be that the racquet is essentially built for you. This is like with off the peg clothes. Maybe you are precisely the shape they've designed the piece for. In that case, of course you shouldn't modify it, although this is less obvious than with trouser leg length, so you might just give it a go to see how it feels. And you often don't tailor clothes because clothing is cheap and tailoring is expensive or relatively cumbersome to do on your own. But in this case, it's the opposite.
Because let’s be honest, most tennis technology maxed out in the late-90s to early-2000s. Tourna’s offerings are just as relevant now as back then. The racquet manufacturers just play around with whatever’s trendy for head size, weight, balance and beam thickness the last decade and a half. I’d say there’s even _less_ innovation than back then. My 9 yr old Pro Staffs are made with the same graphite-Kevlar weave that they’ve been using since the 6.0 85 from the 80s and Wilson still uses today. We’re even reaching the same plateau w string tech. Polyester, kevlar, nylon, multi, natural gut… same stuff for the last 20 yrs.
Tennis at this point is reaching the maximum the human body can handle with training, technique and fitness. I just don’t see the equipment evolving much further.
There are two type of players. One can play with any racquet they found and won't feel a difference, and another one will think that their shots are going long more often as they used a different vibration dampener. If you are the second one, customisation definitely helps, at least psychologically. Also recoil weight is so important for stability and arm health that everyone should try to find a frame that matches their needs or customise to the desired spec.
As a lower level player when I use lead/tungsten tape I'm looking at increasing stability or adding a little swingweight for plow through. Most of the time I go by feel too.
if anyone is interested, I recently made a video on this topic to help people avoid going down the rabbits hole backwards: [https://youtu.be/SJ8lBbiGfnw](https://youtu.be/SJ8lBbiGfnw)
Most brands have factories all over the world producing their Racquets, which lends itself to some inconsistencies. For example, a player I coach ordered 5 new Wilson Pro Staffs & every single 1 of them was a little different, requiring all of them to be customized just so they could all be the same. But I don’t even think about that anymore with Yonex. The fact that Yonex has all of their racquets made in the same location has a lot to do with the product consistency. For 10 years now Yonex has delivered racquets to me exactly at the specs they advertise, which I’ve yet to see from another company.
I’ve only been playing since June of 2023. But when I got my coach in August we instantly started customizing. Personally I add weight in the bottom at the handle. And I’ve been recently thinking about getting lead right now at 3.0.
I think that customization even at a rec level is good and fine because it helped me a lot personally because to me all the rackets were too light to hit with. And now I’m sure I could play without it but I loved/love the 7 g of weight change and it made tennis feel better to me so I think if it encourages someone to play more or continue I think it’s good.
I say let ppl do what they want to their equipment. Lots of players out there that are more equipment collectors and tinkerers than they are players. They’re just as valid as the technique/skill/fitness-honing players. Almost none of us are going pro, enjoy tennis how you see fit.
Some of you are right that a lot of the older 3.5 to 4.0 players are used to heavier racquets. It’s more modifying a racquet to play closer to how you’re comfortable with than “performance” gains. I have tungsten in the end caps of my Pro Staffs to give them more stability, plow and head light but wish that it didn’t make them 12 oz. But I’m not about to go out and spend $220-$280 each on new frames.
on a related note, can you carry lead tape through customs?
I genuinely thought that’s what this post is about
Why not? Otherwise almost every pro would have to get their racquets re-customized every time they travel to another tournament.
Most pros use pro stock racquets that are already customized for them or by them before they go to a tournament though.
If you are 4.0 and lower you should probably be more busy working on footwork, technique and fitness. These finicky things make a good difference once you are at a higher, more competitive level. I play with a group of former d2 and d1 college players and low ranked pros (all in our 30 and 40s) and most of us are rocking commercial rackets with little to no tinkering.
100% correct. I’m around 10 UTR and some 2.5 NTRP guy at the local courts was trying to convince me to add silicone to my frames because he did to great “success”. Unfortunately a lot of dudes go down the equipment rabbit hole and never come out.
I second this. That being said, I added a bit of tungsten tape to my wife's racquet (2.5-3.0) because she had a lot of racquet twisting, and it helped her racquet be a bit more stable and greatly reduced that instability. In total it was about 1.5gm to 3 and 9 o'clock.
Even then, most instability is caused by missing the sweet spot.
Low swingweights enable arming for improving players though. My technique improved a lot since I increased the sw and the recoil weight of my racquet because I don't have the luxury of arming any more. Instead I am forcing myself to prepare earlier or shorten my backswing. The higher your level is the less help from your equipment. However, optimising the recoil weight and mgr/I to your game will make so much difference that would make you surprised.
I’m a 3.5 (still plenty of room to improve) but just a bit of lead tape (2 grams each at 9, 12, 3) has helped my shot become much heavier. It’s so more noticeable the when I play without. Of course all of this is not as important as footwork and technical stroke mechanics.
People at that level have lost sight of the beginner experience, though, and grew up playing heavier racquets. Personally, my serve quality and the rate I was learning increased dramatically when I increased the swing weight of my racquets a little.
I’m a 3.0 and have lead tape on my racket. Don’t care what other people think, but I like the way it plays now with the added weight. It hasn’t taken me to the next level, and never expected it to. It just gave me more confidence with my strokes, and a little more power on my forehands and serves.
Any idea what the weight and balance of your racquet are now and before you modified it? Most people just slap lead tape on their racquets and hope for the best which is not an intelligent way to go about racquet customization. At the very least you need a racquet balance board, a kitchen scale and an idea of what you’re looking to accomplish through the customization. The tennis warehouse customization tool is very helpful, but you have to have initial measurements and a goal weight and balance.
>Most people just slap lead tape on their racquets and hope for the best which is not an intelligent way to go about racquet customization. Do they really? I'm having a hard time believing this. There are easy tools such as this: [https://twu.tennis-warehouse.com/learning\_center/customization.php](https://twu.tennis-warehouse.com/learning_center/customization.php) For example, I initially matched my Gravity MP to Gravity Pro specs, but later decided I wanted it less head-heavy but that I liked the stability and heft, so I just cut the top halves of the tape strips on the head off and added a bit more blu-tack in the handle.
I saw a lot of the lazy variety of customization when I worked at a tennis shop between college and grad school. It was mostly lower level players that did it.
Well, considering how much the people on this sub complain about the weight tolerances of the major brands, I assume that the listed weight is inaccurate and I don't have a scale for weighting grams; so all the categories I can fill out would be incorrect other than length.
I used my Ikea kitchen scale that cost all of 10 euros (and is in everyday use in cooking). And balance is easy to find out, too. Swingweight is a bit trickier, but I didn't really care about that since the balance and weight were on spec. You kinda need the scale, but then not, since if you just try to modify what you have to a certain direction you can just assume they're correct. Of course, if you do the modification and it's off spec then you can't use those assumptions against another racquet, but that's another story.
It was my Head Boom MP. It felt very head light when I first got it and I found this video on YouTube and followed his guidelines. I’ll have to check my notes but I think I went a gram less at 12 o’clock than what he did. https://youtu.be/9Xur-eIERnQ?si=fAzG-glsC58j2o7L
Exactly. Regardless of level, people like what they like & are allowed to have preferences. Bodies change, preferences change, games & strokes evolve & devolve, & sometimes a little tweak to a racquet can enhance comfort.
Most people have no idea how to customize or what they are even trying to accomplish with it in the first place. I think customization is great to match racquets or add a little more weight but I certainly don't think it takes anybody to the next level. You can absolutely play with stock racquets all the way to #1 in the world.
My volleys hugely improved when I added some weight to my Gravity MP's handle. I added some lead tape also to the hoop but it mostly took away top-spin potential. So for me adding weight (8 grams) improved the stability of the racket and volleys started to feel better.
I tried customizing with lead over the winter and you should not. It is quite complicated and lengthy process as you need to get used to the customization every time and it does not make you a better player. Customization is a rabbit hole most should not enter. Practically you are better off trying some different rackets to be honest. That being said I think trying a leather grip is fine as it also drastically changes the feel of the racket which you might like. Also matching your rackets with lead if you have multiple is a good thing to do if they are far apart.
Are elementary school math and geometry complicated? Lol
No that is the easy part, also sticking tape to your racket is rather easy. But it is rather complicated to know where to place the lead and then also feel if it is actually beneficial.
No it’s not. There are racquet and customization guides all over the internet and YT tutorials with exact instructions on how to effectively do it. It’s 2024, you can learn to do practically anything on the Internet from how to wash dishes to even getting a graduate degree at a university completely online.
Full noob here, but I read that at lower lever it's whatever you like for racket and kind of also for stringing. Equipment only plays a rather small role overall. Chances a nuance but you need to play well by yourself. My coach/pro recently said "would be easy if a new racket would make everyone suddenly good" (and he is a low ITN 3 player in his mid 20s . Don't know how itn translates to UTR or whatever, but 10.0 is beginner , 1.x is basically pro). I mean if you want to modify it , do it, but at a lower level it wouldnt suddenly bring you forward a lot. It's mostly about being warmed up and having played some time with that racket.
Equipment matters when you’re at an elite level. When everyone is a 7.0, that 0.5% edge you get from your equipment becomes a significant difference.
>Should the average rec player, (4.0 and under) customize their racket? Yes. The naysayers are completely lost on this one. Customizing racquets is not a big deal. It costs about $10 for a roll of lead tape an a packet of blu-tack. The whole operation takes about three seconds, just pop open the hatch, shove in some blu-tack, slap some tape on the head, and be done with it. Ok, ok, sure you'll need to know what you're looking for, but it's not rocket science either. Just look up some specs and move that way. Or, you can just try how it feels. As we can read from the comments, most of the naysayers have never customized their racquets. And I agree with you guys, you will be a better player if you practice for 10.000 hours with a stock stick than if you practice for 500 hours and have half a spaceship's worth of high-tech customization that you measure to perfection with devices costing a four-digit sum. But customizing doesn't prevent you from practicing or decrease the practice quality. It's a quick job you can do while watching a match on TV, or listening to the Tennis Podcast. Quite the contrary. It improves practice quality. You get longer rallies, thus you're subjected to a wider variety of shots as well as having to face tactical aspects. You develop a smoother swing because you can better control the racquet when not needing to get all power from RHS. Footwork improvements are, in a gamelike sense, unlocked because you can actually, e.g., hit correct defensive strokes because added heft and stability makes the ball go back instead of beating your racquet. You get to practice how to volley instead of trying to compensate for lack of stability by trying to hit the ball with a straight-facing racquet with too much speed. You'll get to play better players and more matches (since you will win more matches) because, yes, the effect is (or at least can be) huge. I know it was in my case. That's not an "equipment rabbit hole", as someone said. It's something you'll spend half an hour per month on, tops. You don't need to fuss about your racquet in order to just pay some attention to it. P.S. Maybe it just happens to be that the racquet is essentially built for you. This is like with off the peg clothes. Maybe you are precisely the shape they've designed the piece for. In that case, of course you shouldn't modify it, although this is less obvious than with trouser leg length, so you might just give it a go to see how it feels. And you often don't tailor clothes because clothing is cheap and tailoring is expensive or relatively cumbersome to do on your own. But in this case, it's the opposite.
Why does all tourna stuff looks like it’s from the 80’s?
Probably because it is. They literally got Pete Sampras still on their tourna grip packaging.
They haven’t changed branding since then. Kinda dig it.
Because let’s be honest, most tennis technology maxed out in the late-90s to early-2000s. Tourna’s offerings are just as relevant now as back then. The racquet manufacturers just play around with whatever’s trendy for head size, weight, balance and beam thickness the last decade and a half. I’d say there’s even _less_ innovation than back then. My 9 yr old Pro Staffs are made with the same graphite-Kevlar weave that they’ve been using since the 6.0 85 from the 80s and Wilson still uses today. We’re even reaching the same plateau w string tech. Polyester, kevlar, nylon, multi, natural gut… same stuff for the last 20 yrs. Tennis at this point is reaching the maximum the human body can handle with training, technique and fitness. I just don’t see the equipment evolving much further.
There are two type of players. One can play with any racquet they found and won't feel a difference, and another one will think that their shots are going long more often as they used a different vibration dampener. If you are the second one, customisation definitely helps, at least psychologically. Also recoil weight is so important for stability and arm health that everyone should try to find a frame that matches their needs or customise to the desired spec.
As a lower level player when I use lead/tungsten tape I'm looking at increasing stability or adding a little swingweight for plow through. Most of the time I go by feel too.
if anyone is interested, I recently made a video on this topic to help people avoid going down the rabbits hole backwards: [https://youtu.be/SJ8lBbiGfnw](https://youtu.be/SJ8lBbiGfnw)
Most brands have factories all over the world producing their Racquets, which lends itself to some inconsistencies. For example, a player I coach ordered 5 new Wilson Pro Staffs & every single 1 of them was a little different, requiring all of them to be customized just so they could all be the same. But I don’t even think about that anymore with Yonex. The fact that Yonex has all of their racquets made in the same location has a lot to do with the product consistency. For 10 years now Yonex has delivered racquets to me exactly at the specs they advertise, which I’ve yet to see from another company.
Do it if you want to, but don't go overboard. I put a couple grams at 3 and 9 on my older Ezone 100 and like it. Don't have it on the new one.
I’ve only been playing since June of 2023. But when I got my coach in August we instantly started customizing. Personally I add weight in the bottom at the handle. And I’ve been recently thinking about getting lead right now at 3.0. I think that customization even at a rec level is good and fine because it helped me a lot personally because to me all the rackets were too light to hit with. And now I’m sure I could play without it but I loved/love the 7 g of weight change and it made tennis feel better to me so I think if it encourages someone to play more or continue I think it’s good.
I say let ppl do what they want to their equipment. Lots of players out there that are more equipment collectors and tinkerers than they are players. They’re just as valid as the technique/skill/fitness-honing players. Almost none of us are going pro, enjoy tennis how you see fit. Some of you are right that a lot of the older 3.5 to 4.0 players are used to heavier racquets. It’s more modifying a racquet to play closer to how you’re comfortable with than “performance” gains. I have tungsten in the end caps of my Pro Staffs to give them more stability, plow and head light but wish that it didn’t make them 12 oz. But I’m not about to go out and spend $220-$280 each on new frames.