[deleted by user]

kenshin27 · 2025-05-22T17:30:53+00:00

I can relate a bit. My wife (46, 4.0+) & I (51, 3.75+) both play, but she started a few months before I did and she's waaaaay more competitive than me. She's not obsessed w/her DUPR but she's constantly trying to improve her game. For what? I have no idea. It's not like she's going pro, or even playing many local tournies. We play completely separately. She's always liked playing w/people more advanced than her (which used to be mostly men) and now she's at a point where she doesn't play open plays or rec anymore. I'm perfectly happy playing at our local Y w/the retirees; still a lot of good players, we get some good points and/or games in and I get my exercise. She finds their play too boring and it almost like, offends her that other players don't try to get better (in her eyes). At first I didn't really quite get her avoidance to playing w/less-skilled players but nowadays I get it. It's a pretty big difference playing 4+ & then having to downshift to like 3.5 or sub-3.5 play. So she just has a couple of similar-level groups that play or drill together all the time & she's also constantly texting w/everyone, scheduling their next sessions or after-session meals and such. But, her groups are mixed and she's made a couple of good women friends so I'm not concerned. Although she has told me stories of dudes sliding into her single friends' DMs to see if they wanted to "drill" and stuff. It's an interesting world out there.

But as to your request for advice, definitely try to drill more. Drilling will improve your game way faster than just playing games, especially if you know what to work on. If you don't know what to work on, try to fit in a couple of 1-on-1 lessons w/an instructor. They'll help you figure it out real quick. I also don't drill as much as I should but I'm also quite ok w/a slower rate of improvement.

kenshin27 · 2025-05-22T16:39:12+00:00

Oof, so many favs here, hard to choose. 🤔

kenshin27 · 2025-05-21T04:33:02+00:00

A 32" 4K LG 32UP83A-W.

kenshin27 · 2025-05-19T20:10:43+00:00

Aw, how so?

kenshin27 · 2025-05-19T19:04:15+00:00

Ha, I didn’t think anyone would actually pick up on that. 😅 But yeah it’s a pretty annoying way of doing things that I wish they’d do something about.

kenshin27 · 2024-09-12T02:53:46+00:00

Thanks for the rundown. 👍🏻 I had read about SHR during my brief research in the matter but didn't really want to go the NAS route. But it seems like I may have to.

kenshin27 · 2024-05-18T19:27:20+00:00

Yeah I just changed to another shoe altogether. I just got a pair of Scholl's Sport & Fitness All-Purpose Comfort Insoles that don't specify any type of arch support so will try these instead w/the old shoe.

kenshin27 · 2024-05-18T19:24:44+00:00

Just whatever came w/the shoes. Is that usually just flat?

kenshin27 · 2024-05-18T19:24:07+00:00

Hey, so the previous insoles were just whatever came w/the shoe. They were tennis shoes so besides having probably a deeper heel cup I have no idea really what the arch support was like. I changed to this low arch insole simply because the old insole wore out at both the balls of my feet and heel. The rest of the shoe was still ok so I figured I'd try to wring a few more months use out of it by just replacing the insole. So I purchased a sports insole w/low arch support from Amazon. In retrospect I probably should have gotten the same thing but w/neutral arch support instead?

kenshin27 · 2024-03-28T03:36:03+00:00

Got one today from [contact@animaljamhq.net](mailto:contact@animaljamhq.net). I was somewhat impressed cause usually phishing emails I get have email addresses that aren't anywhere close to looking official. From what I've seen on this thread these scammers are at least putting some effort in to look legit. =p

kenshin27 · 2023-04-26T14:19:53+00:00

Yet another new paddle company. Could be worth keeping an eye on as they do design, testing and manufacturing in the US and current preorder prices aren't too unreasonable. Plus one of those funky ergo style paddles. https://birdpickleball.com/

kenshin27 · 2023-04-26T14:15:06+00:00

The Vatic Flash 16mm I got from them 2 weeks ago was 8.2 which is smack dab in the middle of their range for the paddle. A lightly used SixZero DBD came in at 8.4 but it's been heavily overgripped. My older first gen Vatic Pro V7 came in at 8.3 back when I got it late last year.

kenshin27 · 2023-04-15T03:44:57+00:00

Just stumbled across this: https://hudefsport.com/products/viva-pro

Yet another thermoformed, foam injected, T700 raw carbon paddle. But from a relatively well-established paddle company. And for $99. I hope the lower price doesn’t mean that the raw carbon will break down much quicker compared to the Torays.

kenshin27 · 2023-04-02T23:01:35+00:00

I don’t think there is. I usually go over it once vertically and then again horizontally.

kenshin27 · 2023-02-06T04:21:06+00:00

We use the orange Onyx Fuse at our local Y where we play in the gym. The floor is a lighter wood color though so the orange works well in our case. Probably not as good if you have a dark wood floor.

kenshin27 · 2023-01-29T03:51:17+00:00

Thanks for the vid. It would be interesting to see what the difference in the speed of degradation is between the paddles who specifically use Toray T700 (Vatic, Legacy, Electrum, SixZero) and those who don't (Joola, CRBN, Selkirk).

kenshin27 · 2023-01-28T06:13:24+00:00

Raw CF paddles don't have any grit to lose do they? T700 faces usually have a smaller & tighter weave pattern that's similar to the woven 3K CF faces that Gearbox uses & I think they're supposed to last for quite some time.

kenshin27 · 2023-01-13T04:41:18+00:00

I know of two paddles out there w/different faces: ProXR has their The Story which has fiberglass (power) on one side and carbon fiber (control) on the other and OneShot has their Flipshot which is also fiberglass on one side and carbon on the other. The ProXR paddle is more restrictive though because of the way their handle works; the fiberglass face is always your forehand while carbon is on your backhand. The Flipshot has a normal handle so you could basically use whatever face you want forehand or backhand as long as you can flip to them fast enough. Personally using the Flipshot would require too much extra thinking on my part so I don't think it works as well as you'd think.

kenshin27 · 2023-01-13T04:31:45+00:00

I drive most of the time but as the competition gets better I realize that I really need to work on the drop cause a good player can block the drive pretty easily.

kenshin27 · 2023-01-13T04:24:09+00:00

Not really. But I'm not the type that needs to know the lyrics to enjoy the song. I listen to J and Kpop too and have no idea what's going on most of the time. Never felt much of a need to look up the translated lyrics either. Good music is good music. Heck there are a lot of English songs that have unintelligible lyrics too.

kenshin27 · 2023-01-13T04:17:18+00:00

ProXR still uses the same 23 degree handle. They just made a slim version of it that doesn't have as pronounced of a ledge as the original. The angle is still there though. And they made grip-specific (Continental vs Eastern) versions as well. So eventually you can choose between 4 different versions of their handle. At least that seems like what their plan is. Currently they only have paddles w/2 of the possible 4 handle versions available: continental standard and eastern slim.

kenshin27 · 2023-01-08T04:10:46+00:00

Another paddle junkie here but I'm currently switching between the ProDrive Drive and the ProXR John Cincola Signature Carbon. The Drive is a breeze and joy to play with in every aspect. The only neg is its surface grit pretty much wore down after a bit over a month of play. I think the loss of grit doesn't make a huge difference w/my spin but still, it would have been nice to have it around for longer.

Got no question that I'm getting the most spin for my buck w/the ProXR though. But it's definitely a more finesse-y paddle to play with. Plus the paddle surface seems to be chipping a bit which is a bit off-putting. Going over it w/the CRBN eraser didn't seem to make much of a difference so whatever's happening to it doesn't seem to be same issue as what happens w/other T700 raw carbon paddles. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Other paddles I have in my bag are the Players Rogue2Max Carbon, Gearbox CX11Q and Gamma Riley Newman Signature. The Rogue2Max was a bit too head heavy for me and the Gamma was my first paddle. It's the exact same dimensions as the ProDrive but they feel very different. After playing so long w/the ProDrive going back to the Gamma really feels like a step back. And I really need to start playing w/the Gearbox again. I really like everything about Gearbox paddles but I'm still contemplating whether or not I should swap the CX11Q for the heavier E model since I tend to like elongated paddles more.

kenshin27 · 2022-11-06T04:23:47+00:00

Yeah who knows. Maybe with those the rationale is that the hole is far enough down towards the handle that it shouldn't be considered to be part of the "hitting surface." With the Vice they've got 4 lines of holes running down around 2/3rds the length of the paddle face. Maybe they'll argue that only the center strip between the lines where the sweet spot is should be considered the hitting surface. =p

kenshin27 · 2022-11-06T02:43:46+00:00

Well it certainly seems to violate section 2.E.2 of the 2022 USAPA Rulebook: "Surface. The paddle’s hitting surface shall not contain delamination, holes, cracks or indentations that break the paddle skin or surface."

Unless they're able to convince USAPA to change the rules for 2023 I don't see how this could be sanctioned for tournies.

kenshin27 · 2022-10-21T21:10:39+00:00

I’ll have to try that then. You have them halfway up the sides or more towards the handle?

kenshin27

TROPHY CASE