Cornilleau is, to my eyes at least, a really small brand which is really under rated! This season I played with Airoc Astro M on my fh and I have to say that I was very pleased with it. Only thing that bothered me with it was durability which was pretty low. That was the reason why I looked for new rubber for next season. Luckily my practice mate plays with Cornilleau and I was able to test his old rubbers. I´m playing in second highest league in my country and my win/loose ratio is 50/50.
First of all this rubber is FAST and has really grippy, thin and elastic/soft top sheet. Overall Astro M and Ultimum 47.5 has quite similar playing characteristics (you can look my review of Asrto M) so swiching to TU was really easy.Target Ulitums speed is a bit higher than Astro M but the main difference between these rubbers is spin. With new ball, especially Nittaku premium, I can generate a lot more spin with TU than Astro M. TU´s throw angle is medium.
Serving
Grippy and elastic topsheet allows me to generate a lots of spin to my serve. It is also really easy to keep serve low and short. On the other hand I can get really nice kick to my fast and slow kick serves. Since serving is my main weapon and I get lots of straight points with my serve I really love TU and it´s properties in this department.
Blocking
Eventough TU is really fast and grippy it is quite insensitive to incoming spin. That makes blocking quite easy.
Short game
Becouse of elastic, thin and grippy top sheet TU feels quite comfortable in short game. I´m able to recieve short serves short whit nice spin quite easily. I have to say that whit Astro M I was able to keep my returns short a bit easily but I wasn´t able to generate as much spin with it compairing to TU. Flips are not strongest part of my game but I feel that those are a bit easier to execute with TU that Astro M.
Looping/driveing
When I´m looping I can generate lots of spin without maximum effort. I can control my loops really well. Lifting under spin is quite easy and when I´m at the right position I can loop hard opening loops with cood control. When I´m of the position lifting under spin with slow and spinny loop works really well with TU.
Counter loops and drives of the bounce needs good timing becouse TU is a really fast and springy rubber. I have had to close my racket a bit more on counter drives compairing to Astro M but when timing is right I can execute couterloops and drives quite nicely. Counterlooping from mid/far distance are really easy to execute without maximum effort.
Passive play
I really aggressive player so I can´t really say much about this but due to high speed/control ratio of TU I would say that this is quite good rubber for passive play.
Over all I think that Target Ultimum is really under rated rubber (meaning really few poeple are using it). It is fast and spinny rubber with good control. However I think that you need a solid technique and decent touch if you want to unleash the full potential of this rubber. I can warmly recomend this rubber all of you who are looking for a rubber for aggressive attacking game. I have played one season with Rhyzm, one season with Donic JP02, one season with Astro M and tested T05, T80 and T80fx and I have to say that to me Target Ultimum feels clearly the best rubber of all these speed spin and durability wise.
Cheers,
Tommi
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