Tennis Racket Technology and Serve Speed

[gzhpcu]

Stanley Pagenhoef in his book "Fundamentals of Tennis", 1970, shows a graph of ball velocity (first serves) in function of striking mass in grams (dependent on grip firmness) for numerous top players using wooden rackets in the late 1960's.

Note that 100 mph was considered fast and John Newcombe hit some first serves only around 70 mph. Gonzales hits around 95 mph, Laver around 100 mph. These are not representative for the players, of course, but it does show that 100 mph was close to the top speed in the late 60's.

Roscoe Tanner, departing from wood, using the aluminum PDP Open racket was close to 140 mph.

So, give the top servers a wooden racket today, and I don't think they would be serving much more than 100mph...

Would be really interesting to have a tennis tournament with top players and wooden rackets. I think Roger would beat Rafa on clay with a wooden racket...

[johnyandell]

Plagenhoff never got his due. Here's a tragic tale. After his death his family discarded all the priceless high speed movie film that his book was based on...found this out when I tried to acquire it.

[gsheiner]

I'm pretty sure tennis magazine had an issue years ago when Phillipousis served with both his regular racket and with a wood racket. If i remember correctly, he was able to serve in the 120's with wood. The difference was that he didn't have the same level of consistency and control with the wood racket.

I'm sure someone else on this forum remembers the issue.

[gsheiner]

Not to mention that I remember reading somewhere that Colin Dibley used to serve extremely fast, again if I recall correctly in the 140's.

[johnyandell]

gs,

True about Philippoussis. Might have been 125.

[gzhpcu]

Be that as it may, the average serve speed of yesteryear's top players was a good bit lower than those of today's.

[stotty]

I think a few players from yesteryear took advantage of technology before others realised there was an advantage at all.

I have a Wilson T4000 and some Maxply rackets which I occasional bring out for fun in my advanced squads. All the kids notice a big difference between the T4000 and the Maxply in terms of stiffness and power. Strange the pro's back then didn't pick up the advantage as quickly as they might have.

Gonzales used some kind of metal racket and must have been one of its earliest pioneers. Roscoe Tanner and Connors were amongst the early ones to use metal frames before other players started to fully convert on mass.

I think Mecir was the last player to turn out the light of the wooden racket era.

[stroke]

I'm pretty sure tennis magazine had an issue years ago when Phillipousis served with both his regular racket and with a wood racket. If i remember correctly, he was able to serve in the 120's with wood. The difference was that he didn't have the same level of consistency and control with the wood racket.

I'm sure someone else on this forum remembers the issue.

I remember that as well. Tennis magazine also had Mark serve with a very light game improvement racquet, which had just come into vogue, and he could only hit 80's or so.

[stroke]

I think a few players from yesteryear took advantage of technology before others realised there was an advantage at all.

I have a Wilson T4000 and some Maxply rackets which I occasional bring out for fun in my advanced squads. All the kids notice a big difference between the T4000 and the Maxply in terms of stiffness and power. Strange the pro's back then didn't pick up the advantage as quickly as they might have.

Gonzales used some kind of metal racket and must have been one of its earliest pioneers. Roscoe Tanner and Connors were amongst the early ones to use metal frames before other players started to fully convert on mass.

I think Mecir was the last player to turn out the light of the wooden racket era.

Remember when Borg tried a comeback with his old wood racquets?

[GeoffWilliams]

Three mph difference: 124 vs 127mph.

[stotty]

I'm pretty sure tennis magazine had an issue years ago when Phillipousis served with both his regular racket and with a wood racket. If i remember correctly, he was able to serve in the 120's with wood. The difference was that he didn't have the same level of consistency and control with the wood racket.

I'm sure someone else on this forum remembers the issue.

Yes, I remember it well. The thing is could Pousis serve at that pace all afternoon with a wooden racket? A player, above all other strokes, perhaps has the best chance to serve equally well with wood as, essentially, serving is done from a static position. Hitting groundshots from wide positions is an entirely different matter and this is where modern rackets enter a class of their own.

Another interesting aside is that in 1951 the forehand speed of several players of the day were measured:

Pancho Gonzales hit the fastest, at 112.88 mph, followed by Jack Kramer at 107.8 and Welby Van Horn at 104. Not bad even by today's standards, wouldn't you say?

[gzhpcu]

The new rackets have between a half to 2/3's of the mass of the old wooden rackets and generate more power (rebounding ball speed of the head). In addition, the new frames have a larger sweet spot as well.

The serve is getting more dominant. According to Rod Cross, the IFT Technica Commision looked into this question by analyzing the past 20 years of Grand Slam events (over 90,000 sets) and showed that in men's tennis the number of tie breaks played increased with time, showing the dominance of the serve. Grand Slams were analyzed because they are played on different surfaces and have the least turnover of players from tournament to tournament for a given year.

Also we have better means of measuring serve speed. For example, Bill Tilden was quoted as having hit a 163mph serve! No way.

This link lists the fastet serves measured:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fastest..._tennis_serves

Note that the only old time players standing out are Tanner and Phillipoussis. Shows that they were exceptions with very live arms. It is mentioned that the Tanner record is doubtful due to the poor radar guns they had at that time. Vic Braden says that Gonzales had an effortless serve motion and could be easily hitting 140mph serves today.

[stotty]

The serve is getting more dominant. According to Rod Cross, the IFT Technica Commision looked into this question by analyzing the past 20 years of Grand Slam events (over 90,000 sets) and showed that in men's tennis the number of tie breaks played increased with time, showing the dominance of the serve. Grand Slams were analyzed because they are played on different surfaces and have the least turnover of players from tournament to tournament for a given year.

Strange because I think second serves are getting weaker. At Roland Garros last week returners were contacting the ball four feet or so inside the base line. At the Aussie Open this was the case also. Servers seem happy to roll second serves in to start the rally, nothing more. I think players are giving their second serves less consideration in terms of placement and accuracy.

Returners have yet to take full advantage of this loophole. You'd think Djokovic and Murray would taking greater risks off second serves.