Xuperman S1 Review
Just finished a tournament playing with this blade. It was a league style tournament divided into groups, I was in the second strongest group and got 3rd out of 9 people in my group! My best performance at a tournament so far with 5 wins and 3 losses. Obviously the blade is not the reason for the good results, rather me improving, but I still am very happy with how this blade plays. The FH rubber is DHS H3N National Blue Sponge 40 deg 2.1mm boosted with 2 layers Haifu Seamoon II and BH rubber is D09c 2.1mm. Here are my thoughts:
First Impressions
When doing standard FH drives to warm up, I can feel that this blade is faster than the Andro VCI and a teeny bit faster than DHS King Acb. It’s still slower than the Viscaria however. I could control this blade very easily without missing much at all.
Forehand
I really like this blade for FH. It was controlled but still fast and spinny that my opponents had trouble dealing with the spin. I don’t feel the blade is as crisp as the Viscaria, but it is similar to the acB and more crisp than the VCI. The arc is lower than acB and VCIc but higher than Viscaria. I have a lot of power, and With my Viscaria I always felt uncomfortable with Fh as I was afraid to overshoot the table, this blade is much better at giving me confidence to land my FH loop on the table.
Backhand
BH loops don’t feel as nice with this blade than with Viscaria, but it was much better than VCI and acB. BH loops were spinny and fast as well, with a nice arc. I won so many points at the tournament due to my BH. I actually prefer the feeling of this blade on BH than Viscaria because with Viscaria, the arc combined with D09c was very high on BH and a bit uncomfortable. The arc of S1 with 09c felt perfect to me. It’s strange how I feel FH Vis and H3 arc is lower than S1 and H3 arc, but BH Vis and 09c arc is higher than S1 and 09c arc.
Short Game and Flicks
The blade is very controlled and easy in the short game. So much so I dumped many serves into the net because I was too used to the bouncy nature of Viscaria in the short game. S1 short game is very similar to VCI and acB short game. FH flicks were direct but a bit hard to execute compared to the two other inner carbon blades, while BH flicks were easy and spinny.
Counters
I really like counter topspin with this blade, whether it be FH or BH. It had a nice crisp feel with a decent arc and wasnt hard to do. It felt easier to counter with this blade than acB and Viscaria, but harder than the VCI.
Blocking
Blocking took a bit of time to get used to due to being used to how a Viscaria blocks. Once I figured it out, I could not miss any block with this blade. The blocks are a bit low arc so you might have to adjust and go up a little on blocks, but it was one of the best blocking blades I’ve ever tried.
Conclusion
I really like this blade, especially at only $88 USD. It plays like all the high end blades and is a great choice for many players. It feels like an in between blade of the Viscaria and the two inner carbon blades I’ve tried. The arc of the blade might take a bit of time to get used to, but once you do it’s a lovely feeing blade. I recommend this blade to intermediates and above who like a medium arcing blade with the inner carbon structure. I want to try either the Apolonia ZLC or Franziska ZLC to see if there are any differences between them to S1 since all 3 blades are the exact same composition. Thanks for reading the review and lmk if you have any questions
