The start of the open era in , when professionals and amateurs began competing together for cash prizes, was probably a key driver behind the rapid development of tennis racquets seen around this period. During the s wooden rackets were still the most common, but fibre-reinforced composite materials such as fibreglass started to appear as a reinforcement on wooden frames, like the Challenge Power by Slazenger and the Kramer Cup by Wilson.
By the s, racquet engineers were experimenting with a range of materials, such as wood, fibre-reinforced composites, aluminium and steel. A key racquet from this period was the Classic by Prince, based on a patent from Howard Head. The Classic was made of aluminium, which allowed for a much larger head than its wooden predecessors and made it easier to hit the ball. Plastic grommets were used to overcome the issue of string now synthetic damage experienced with earlier metal rackets.
The Classic set the foundations for the modern tennis raquet, with most of its successors featuring large heads.
Indeed, the International Tennis Federation began limiting racket size in , so technological developments would not change the nature of the game. Since the s, high-end tennis racquets have been made from fibre-reinforced composite materials, such as fibreglass, carbon fibre and aramid strong synthetic fibres. The advantage of these composite materials over wood and metal is their high stiffness and low density, combined with manufacturing versatility.
Blog Menu. The first steel rackets Early steel racket beside a wooden racket. Credit: Eric Long Smithsonian Institution The first steel racket was launched by Wilson in , the Wilson T was a major advancement in racket evolution. John Isner hitting a mph serve at the Wimbledon Semi Final They developments over the years have helped players hit the ball at huge speeds and helped tennis become one of the fastest sports in the world.
Previous Article Next Article. Create a Campaign Get in touch. They are speaking about us Winner of best sports website at the Eircom Spider awards. Some companies have experimented with adding other materials such as titanium and Kevlar to see if the racket will improve. So far, nothing radical has changed in how they make rackets. Kevlar is similar to graphite, with the only difference being that it is lighter, stiffer, and transmits vibrations more readily.
Beginners find that both Kevlar and titanium tennis rackets have become hard to control and hard on the arms after an extended amount of time. There are a few tennis rackets that are designed today for specific situations with different specs:. Power rackets are available in a wide variety. If you are looking for a great power racket, the Wilson Hyper Hammer 5. It will give you a ton of power on your shots. Any price and availability information displayed on [relevant Amazon Site s , as applicable] at the time of purchase will apply to the purchase of this product.
These rackets are for more experienced players and are generally harder to use. This is insanely beneficial once you get the hang of them. These have thin beams and are smaller in terms of tennis racket heads.
In between the two extremes mentioned above, there are mid-power and mid-control tennis rackets. These are great for beginners because they provide a happy medium between power and control.
All companies who produce tennis rackets have a racket that fits in this category today, and they all range in price and sizing. For a great all-around racket, look no further than the Babolat Pure Drive. The Babolat Pure Drive series continues to be the best selling racket in the world. The sizing of tennis rackets throughout history is an exciting thing to observe, as it changes in such fluctuations and is still changing today.
Most players tend to stick to a wider head but light and sloping frame, while others might favor heavier and more powerful tennis rackets. The racquet head had grown by this time to roughly the size seen on wooden racquets into the 's, but the shape wasn't quite as oval, with the head usually wider and often flattened toward the top.
Racquets saw only minor changes between and the end of the wooden racquet era more than years later. Wooden racquets did get better during these years, with improvements in laminating technology using thin layers of wood glued together and in strings, but they remained heavy ounces , with small heads around 65 square inches.
Compared to the contemporary racquet, even the best wood racquets were cumbersome and lacking in power. A racquet with a metal head existed as early as , but it never saw widespread use. Wood's use as a frame material didn't undergo any real challenge until when Wilson Sporting Goods introduced the first popular metal racquet, the T Stronger and lighter than wood, it became a top seller, and Jimmy Connors became its most famous user, playing at the top of men's professional tennis for much of the 's using the long-throated, small-headed steel frame.
In , Howard Head, then working with the Prince brand, introduced the first oversized racquet to gain widespread popularity, the Prince Classic. Weed USA is quick to point out, though, that they had introduced an oversized racquet in The Weed racquets never took off, but the Prince Classic and its more expensive cousin, the Prince Pro, were top sellers.
Both had aluminum frames and a string area more than 50 percent larger than the standard 65 square inch wood racquet. The light weight, huge sweet spot, and greatly increased power of these first oversized racquets made tennis much easier for non-advanced players, but for powerful, advanced players, the mixture of flexibility and power in the frames resulted in too much unpredictability in where the ball would end up.
Hard, off-center shots would momentarily distort the aluminum frame, changing the direction in which the string plane was facing, and the lively string bed would then send the ball rocketing off in a somewhat unintended direction.
Advanced players needed a stiffer frame material, and the best material proved to be a mixture of carbon fibers and a plastic resin to bind them together.
This new material acquired the name "graphite," even though it isn't true graphite such as you would find in a pencil or in lock lubricant. The hallmark of a good racquet quickly became graphite construction. By , racquets could pretty much be divided into two classes: inexpensive racquets made of aluminum and expensive ones made of graphite or a composite.
Wood no longer offered anything that another material couldn't provide better -- except for antique and collectible value.
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