Tennis Balls
Whether you're just starting out playing tennis or you've been playing for ages, most players would agree that a tennis ball is just a tennis ball. When making a purchase you are probably going to pick up standard or regular sized balls which should have a good amount of bounce along with a sturdy felt covering to stand up to the surface of a hard court. When starting out as a beginner, pick up 1 or 2 packages of balls and start hitting them against a wall to get a feel for the way they bounce.
Top Picks
The standard choice is a regular-sized (regular speed) pressurized ball with extra duty felt. If you play infrequently, pressureless balls -- the ones sold in containers, not in bags -- are ideal, since their bounce will increase over time and the deterioration of the felt so common with heavy play with those balls won't be a factor. A beginner needs no more than six balls: In fact, two containers are a good first purchase if you're serious about developing your play.
Things to Consider
- Pressure
- Pressureless balls, which have rubber cores, gain bounce as they age but their felt (see below) tends to wear faster.
- Pressurized have air or nitrogen filled cores have a great feel and pressure right out of the container, but the bounce is short-lived.
- How to test bounce: Drop the ball straight down; it should bounce back up to at least half the distance from which it was dropped.
- Squeeze to test firmness -- over time you'll notice the difference.
- Felt
- Extra-duty felt -- the fuzz on balls-- is best for hard courts because it can withstand the abuse without fraying.
- Regular felt is best for clay
- Size & Speed
- Smaller, harder, more compressed balls (called Type 1 by the International Tennis Federation) are the fastest.
- Traditional sized balls (Type 1) are the standard.
- Bigger balls are slower and have more bounce.
- A movement to slow down professional tennis and decrease the advantage of an extraordinary serve revolves around the bigger Type 3 balls.
- Color
- Tournament balls are usually yellow and, in rare instances, white.
Types of Balls
The four principal varieties of tennis balls, the ones you'll most likely find on the shelf (or in the search results) are:
- Pressureless balls: standard size with extra duty felt.
- Pressurized balls:
- Standard size, regular felt.
- Standard size, extra duty felt.
- Larger size, extra duty felt.
Also: Practice balls are of lesser composition (and so cheaper), though often they're simply defective in a cosmetic way.
Top Manufacturers
External Links
Leave Your Comments, Questions, Opinions!
