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Hi all,
Just wanted to post some observations/thoughts/experiences and see what people think:
History
-Played since summer 2021, no sports before then
-Fh loop practice~year ago
-Best points in a game ~month ago
-Drill practice video, cross-step footwork, underspin to topsin/fh to bh transition today
-Started with Stiga Allround Classic, unboosted Hurricane 3 (and Neo), backhand Rakza Z
-Played 1 tournament last summer, got a rating of ~1200
-Bought myself a Osp Virtuoso Off- as a present
-Losing matches recently, saw many people at clubs keep getting fancy ALC/09c equipment
-Did a whole lot of googling, thought I needed to upgrade to 7 ply, etc
-On a whim decided to try Stiga Allround classic just for fun, LOVED IT!!!
Here are some of my musings on these 2 blades:
- Stiga
-Max feedback. Vibrates like hell, Sounds loud. During tournament, people were popping my no-spin serves and smashing was starting to cause some carpel tunnel like buzzing in my wrist.
-But I know exactly when i brushed vs used some sponged vs hit through sponge. I can get 50 FH loops in a row with the unboosted H3 Neo (yes, after a month it sorta dies and turns dull....more on boosting later).
- Stiga does feel slow especially in match play. Rallies go on forever. [Patrick/PongProfessors review is spot on: Feeling of cant miss a loop, maximum feedback, too thin for decent blocking, catapult in high impact shots can make it fast-ish {https://blog.tabletennis11.com/revi...c-control-allround-classic-samsonov-pure-wood}]
-OSP V-
- Almost 0 feedback. I have to pay attention to even feel anything. Analogy is like driving a Lexus and not feeling any road bumps or knowing your speed without tachometer reference.
- I tried to put same exact rubbers on Stiga/OSP. Relatively, OSP feels boring/dull. Even ALC blades I tried of other people at-least has that carbon pop sound as feedback.
- Significantly faster but requires a lot more precision. E.g. with FH loops, unlike Stiga, I cant correct blade angle last moment. In warmups my loops are like max 10 in a row
- Blade feels stiff, but also seems much softer/duller on impact than Stiga. [How is that possible? Stiga feels sharper/more responsive on impact, but also gives me ton of time to change blade angle at last moment]
- Blocking is heavenly solid. With Stiga, I always think I have 0 blocking skills.
So given:
- My consistency is significantly higher than with Osp V-
- I have a ton more fun with the feeling in Stiga [OSP calls it "controlled feedback" and I can see why. With Stiga, despite all the feedback, I cannot tell where the ball hit unless its way off the center. Same with OSP so some might prefer that.]
-Is there something wrong with me? As in, EVERYONE raves about OSP V- and "feeling", but I cannot seem to get a hang of it despite it being almost a year.
Speed of Osp V- with feel of Stiga would awesome. Is there a compromise? Seems like really the only option is something like Stiga Offensive Classic.
Also, after this experimentation, I absolutely (Trigger Warning!!!) cannot see why someone trying to be a two wing looper needs anything faster than an Off- 5 ply with a slow FH/BH rubber like H3Neo/Rakza Z until they reach a USATT 2000 level (if we define control as looping 50 FH loops with consistency in a row {pleasure to watch;
}). I actually find Rakza Z uncontrollable in FH compared to H3. No dwell time to correct last minute angle changes, serve receive pops up way more than H3. H-80 is somewhere between H3 Neo/Rakza Z but lower throw, more spin, more short game control, less speed and harder to fully activate on loops.
As for Boosting, only tried FTL. I also cannot understand needing more than 1 layer. 2 layers make dwell time very low and rubbers ease of spin does increase but max spin decreases. Feels like more control but actually is not strangely. Though boosted or not boosted H3 feels totally fine on Stiga but with V- the softness feeling of the blade and softening of sponge makes things super fast with weird mushy indirect feeling on all shots. Sometime I boost H3 Neo with one layer after glue layer to revive it, but more seems CRAZZZYYYYY!!!! Also advantage of hard H3 unboosted is even mediocre brush contact gives no spin so lots of serves that look like heavy underspin (which would be w/ other rubbers) can be a no spin serve, so its great for deception.
Thoughts?
Just wanted to post some observations/thoughts/experiences and see what people think:
History
-Played since summer 2021, no sports before then
-Fh loop practice~year ago
-Started with Stiga Allround Classic, unboosted Hurricane 3 (and Neo), backhand Rakza Z
-Played 1 tournament last summer, got a rating of ~1200
-Bought myself a Osp Virtuoso Off- as a present
-Losing matches recently, saw many people at clubs keep getting fancy ALC/09c equipment
-Did a whole lot of googling, thought I needed to upgrade to 7 ply, etc
-On a whim decided to try Stiga Allround classic just for fun, LOVED IT!!!
Here are some of my musings on these 2 blades:
- Stiga
-Max feedback. Vibrates like hell, Sounds loud. During tournament, people were popping my no-spin serves and smashing was starting to cause some carpel tunnel like buzzing in my wrist.
-But I know exactly when i brushed vs used some sponged vs hit through sponge. I can get 50 FH loops in a row with the unboosted H3 Neo (yes, after a month it sorta dies and turns dull....more on boosting later).
- Stiga does feel slow especially in match play. Rallies go on forever. [Patrick/PongProfessors review is spot on: Feeling of cant miss a loop, maximum feedback, too thin for decent blocking, catapult in high impact shots can make it fast-ish {https://blog.tabletennis11.com/revi...c-control-allround-classic-samsonov-pure-wood}]
-OSP V-
- Almost 0 feedback. I have to pay attention to even feel anything. Analogy is like driving a Lexus and not feeling any road bumps or knowing your speed without tachometer reference.
- I tried to put same exact rubbers on Stiga/OSP. Relatively, OSP feels boring/dull. Even ALC blades I tried of other people at-least has that carbon pop sound as feedback.
- Significantly faster but requires a lot more precision. E.g. with FH loops, unlike Stiga, I cant correct blade angle last moment. In warmups my loops are like max 10 in a row
- Blade feels stiff, but also seems much softer/duller on impact than Stiga. [How is that possible? Stiga feels sharper/more responsive on impact, but also gives me ton of time to change blade angle at last moment]
- Blocking is heavenly solid. With Stiga, I always think I have 0 blocking skills.
So given:
- My consistency is significantly higher than with Osp V-
- I have a ton more fun with the feeling in Stiga [OSP calls it "controlled feedback" and I can see why. With Stiga, despite all the feedback, I cannot tell where the ball hit unless its way off the center. Same with OSP so some might prefer that.]
-Is there something wrong with me? As in, EVERYONE raves about OSP V- and "feeling", but I cannot seem to get a hang of it despite it being almost a year.
Speed of Osp V- with feel of Stiga would awesome. Is there a compromise? Seems like really the only option is something like Stiga Offensive Classic.
Also, after this experimentation, I absolutely (Trigger Warning!!!) cannot see why someone trying to be a two wing looper needs anything faster than an Off- 5 ply with a slow FH/BH rubber like H3Neo/Rakza Z until they reach a USATT 2000 level (if we define control as looping 50 FH loops with consistency in a row {pleasure to watch;
As for Boosting, only tried FTL. I also cannot understand needing more than 1 layer. 2 layers make dwell time very low and rubbers ease of spin does increase but max spin decreases. Feels like more control but actually is not strangely. Though boosted or not boosted H3 feels totally fine on Stiga but with V- the softness feeling of the blade and softening of sponge makes things super fast with weird mushy indirect feeling on all shots. Sometime I boost H3 Neo with one layer after glue layer to revive it, but more seems CRAZZZYYYYY!!!! Also advantage of hard H3 unboosted is even mediocre brush contact gives no spin so lots of serves that look like heavy underspin (which would be w/ other rubbers) can be a no spin serve, so its great for deception.
Thoughts?
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