Hard vs soft rubbers

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As you can see this thread is about hard vs soft rubbers.

Everyone is saying I have to use harder rubbers, because I play pretty fast and hard on both sides, but this is the problem I get. If I play with hard rubbers like tenergy, genius, xiom europe,pro I cant get any speed in the ball.

I normally play with an off- blade with soft rubbers and now I'm trying to play with a carbon blade with xiom europe rubbers. So the difference in speed should be pretty high but I'm actually playing slower as before and I got problems topspinning a bal with much backspin.

Something else I noticed is that with harder rubbers I got much more control to play short game, which is not normal because everyone in my club says that with harder rubbers the ball bounces faster of the blade.

So my problems with hard rubbers:

- topspin on backspin ball is difficult, almost impossible for me.
- I cant play fast.

My game is attack on both sides. My forehand stroke is comparable with timo boll (not as good of course) But I play with a chicken wing stroke and not much with my full arm.

My level: For the people on this forum who know craig bryant, I'm playing 2 leagues lower than him, so im not very good but im not bad at all.

So my question to you is why can't I play with harder rubbers. Is this because I play with chicken wing stroke, If anyone can help me or give some tips on how to play with harder rubbers, much appreciated.

P.S: Thanks Dan for the explanation on how to make a thread :)
 
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Hi mate,

Perhaps I'm not reading your post right, but Vega Europe is what I play with and it's one of the softest I've come across, mine is really really soft compared to a dawei inspirit or even mark 5. I've got a Palio Thors and that's feels like concrete compared to the europe.

What sort of rubber do you get well with that's softer?

Shaun
 
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Ah, what xiom europe do you have vega or omega or another? I'm similar to you I find if I use a harder rubber like thors that I have to really hit forward in a longer arm stroke, what people call chinese, so I'm presuming your stroke is just grooved in a way that works better with softer rubbers maybe. If you want to switch you'll have to regroove it a bit maybe with those rubbers.
 
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I used to play with coppa silver or nimbus sound, so thats really soft.

Now I'm trying to play with the omega europe IV or something. And yes if you compare it with a chinese rubber its still "soft", but if you are used to rubbers like nimbus sound, coppa silver it is a really hard rubber.

The main reason I want to play with harder rubbers is because most players in my club told me that I can play harder and with more spin, another reason I would like to play with the omega europe is because of the black sponge. It just looks cool.

Another reason I want to change is donic,stiga or joola keep on making new rubbers and they stop making the old ones, like they did with the coppa silver. So I think its better to change to Xiom or Tibhar, but none of the rubbers really suits my playing style it seems.

If you or anyone else can help me with finding a decent rubber, you would be my hero :p

Tomorrow I will try again with the omega europe with 3-4 layers of boost so if the combination of a carbon blade with omega europe with 4 layers of boost is not fast enough or I cant do 1 decent topspin with it then I have to try something else.
 
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ur question is why can't you play with harder rubbers? perhaps you've built a preference for softer rubbers. I find that having used soft rubber for the last 5 years such as torpedo soft, rapid dtecs soft, tibhar nimbus soft and sound and other similar rubbers, that I don't like playing with hard rubber I find it lacks the feeling that I can achieve with soft rubber and without feeling in my shots I tend to play muccch worse :)
 
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The contact on the ball is so different from Soft rubbers to hard. I have played with The softest like Nimbus Sound, Nimbus Soft being the one i played with longest. I have played equally as long with T05/64. and I even played quite a while with chinese rubbers tuned and untuned. I adapted to all without taking too much time. But i can honestly say in my opinion and experience that Softer rubbers offer the least to your game. They produce the least spin by quite a fair bit and really dont offer u much more control. They do however provide u with fantastic feeling especially if u liked soft rubbers before.
As for short game, the harder the rubber the better the short game yes. You can get more spin and the same if not more speed from your shots but they just simply require a different contact point. All in all with practice the harder rubbers will offer u more. But at the end of the day it is what ur most comfortable with.

On a side note the omega europe has black sponge? What about the red sheet? what colour sponge does the red sheet have?
 
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@PingPongPom I think I did create my strokes for softer rubbers, but because lots of people telling me that I might play better with harder rubbers I thought I would give it a go. But everyone is returning my attacks so easy now, that I'm getting kind of frustrated :p

Tonight I'm going to train again with the omega europe but with a few layers of boost, maybe it makes the rubber a little softer and faster.

@Ndragon I also feel that I can put more spin on any of my shots with harder rubbers, but I like to make points sometimes :p and if everyone is returning my attacks like I'm beginner then I must be doing something wrong with the harder rubbers or harder rubbers are just not for me. But I can't imagine that hard rubbers are not for me since almost the whole world plays with hard rubbers like tenergy.

So I guess I have to stick to the soft rubbers, but I dont really want to do that because I can only play a month with one pair of soft rubbers, and thats pricey.

And yes both sheets have black sponge. It looks really cool :)
 
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Just keep at it. Your problems are similar to mine with soft rubbers. They dont last as long. Although I have another problem with soft rubber which is the FAKE spin. Its easier for opponents to return shots from soft rubbers.
You just need to keep at it and eventually u will learn the strokes and contact points in no time making your entire game better.

The omega europe. How hard it is compared to tenergy?
 
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For me the omega europe feels harder but it probably isnt. It just has a different feeling than tenergy if you know what I mean. For me tenergy was easier to play with but I cant really compare the two rubbers because the tenergy rubber was about 3 months old and the europe is new, so its a diffent feeling. I like it when rubbers are a little older (2-3 weeks is perfect to me), they are alot easier to handle then for me. Season for us is almost over so after that I will give the europe a decent try and see how it plays. But why a softer rubber on an off- blade is faster for me than a harder rubber on a carbon blade is still beyond me.
 
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It is supposed that :

Hard
Speed + Control - Spin - (incl. producability and sensitivity since in harder sponge, the dwell time of the ball becomes less -> the ball sinks less)

Soft
Speed - Control + Spin + (incl. producability and sensitivity since in softer sponge, the dwell time of the ball becomes longer -> the ball sinks more)
 
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Don't worry so much about it. I've been using hard rubbers for quite a while now..and no doubt they create a lot of speed. You must adjust your timing with the transition from soft to hard rubbers. The ball does not have a hang time with hard rubbers, and so to create spin you must have a greater acceleration upon contact to create the extra spin. Good luck buddy
Btw, I use Stiga optimum carbo with Stiga boosts TP and Xiom pro
 
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I practiced a few more weeks with the harder rubbers and now im starting to get the hang of it. I even think the rubbers I got now are to soft :)

I think it just needs time. Im playing with the vega elite on the FH and first I thought it was to hard now I think its too soft, so im going to change to a little harder rubber.

Maybe i will take the xiom pro or europe on my FH.
 
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@PingPongPom I think I did create my strokes for softer rubbers, but because lots of people telling me that I might play better with harder rubbers I thought I would give it a go. But everyone is returning my attacks so easy now, that I'm getting kind of frustrated :p

Tonight I'm going to train again with the omega europe but with a few layers of boost, maybe it makes the rubber a little softer and faster.

@Ndragon I also feel that I can put more spin on any of my shots with harder rubbers, but I like to make points sometimes :p and if everyone is returning my attacks like I'm beginner then I must be doing something wrong with the harder rubbers or harder rubbers are just not for me. But I can't imagine that hard rubbers are not for me since almost the whole world plays with hard rubbers like tenergy.

So I guess I have to stick to the soft rubbers, but I dont really want to do that because I can only play a month with one pair of soft rubbers, and thats pricey.

And yes both sheets have black sponge. It looks really cool :)

Fair enough, let us know how it all goes :)
 
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I saw the Difference between the Soft and Hard Rubbers, After saw this discussion I searched about Soft and Hard Rubbers and I found very inserting and positive view about Soft and Hard Rubbers.
 
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I find that using a more wrist movement while swinging during a loop helps produce slightly more dwell time with a harder sponge thus creating more brush and spin
 
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@Rhydian
I think it is true. With soft rubbers you need to move your racket towards the ball in order to get it over the net, with harder rubbers it is most of the time sufficient to just hold it in one position and let the ball hit the racket. This saves time, and if u have time left u can always play a more active block ball.
 
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