Wednesday, June 9, 2010

When Should I Restring My Tennis Racket

By Jeremy Edwards

Your level and style of play will dictate how often you need to restring your tennis racket. Tennis professionals or elite college players will restring more often than junior competitors or social players. They play and practice a lot, and hit furious topspin with tremendous power for long periods. Juniors and social players tend to practice and play less with a lot less vigour.

Restringing for most juniors and social players occurs when they break a string. Neglected strings wear away with each contact and eventually become so thin they break on contact with the ball.

For the professionals and elite college players the main reason for a restrings lies in their quest for perfection and need for consistent performance. Due to their construction, tennis strings lose their tension overtime. This loss of tension tends to reduce the stiffness of your racket string bed and inadvertently increase its power. An increase in power may lead to more errors. Not what your average or top professional wants or needs when doing battle.

A Tennis professional or elite college player, will usually have their rackets restrung before every practice and match. Many professionals will have as many as twenty rackets freshly strung ready for practice and play. Venus Williams of the USA has been known to have up to 10 freshly strung rackets, available for practice alone.

Restrings can cost you as much as $85 and as little as $20. The pros and college players will generally have a sponsor, but for social players and juniors the cost can quickly mount up. The cost has to be weighed up against the extra consistency you get from fresh strings.

In summary, it would be best to restring before every practice or match, but the cost will generally determine how often you should restring. If you can afford it, go for it, your game will benefit.

If you don't have unlimited funds, consider buying your own tennis stringing machine and some reasonable quality string. Stringing is easy to learn and can be a bit of fun. You can save heaps stringing your own rackets.

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