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Joola
Snabb
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 Strategy:
DEF - / OFF extreme
Speed: Extreme
Spin: Low
Control: Extra high
Hardness: 40°
New short pimples rubber for the uncompromising block and counter attack
player. The hard sponge enables the hardest and fastest stroke play. The
position of the pimples, however, still allows precise and safe strokes,
especially when chopping.
Click here for pricing on Joola Snabb from Megaspin |
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Joola Snabb review: |
Review by: agooding (published with permission)
Joola Snabb is a short pips rubber, I had previously used Joola Tango
Ultra and found that excellent for smashing and looping underspin but
the sponge was so soft I had trouble feeling the ball to roll it.
Joola Snabb (I got a sheet of red, 1.Cool has a medium, not soft
untensioned sponge. I am going to use it unglued, so I prepared it with
1 layer of Ecolo Expander II applied for 18 hours and three coats of
rubber cement and then I let it sit overnight before affixing it to my
blade (a Joola Guo 3C). The blade then sat three days ( I sprained my
ankle and couldn't play) so there should be no significant glue effect
left.
The topsheet is a dark with harder pips than Joola Tango Ultra, similar
to Friendship 802, but not as hard as a rubber like Globe 889 (the
original versus the -2 version). The overall feel of the rubber is
slightly harder, but that enhanced feel and control. I got more spin out
of my over the table shots as a result and the throw angle was similar.
The shot that was most enhanced was the roll. I could do this easily off
long serves, while with the softer sponge Joola Tango Ultra I didn't
have the feel to do this as the rubber bottomed out too quickly and I
got too much "blade effect." The result was that my medium speed opening
was both quicker and more accurate and I could play the ball quicker off
the bounce as I can feel when I'm using the rubber to spin the ball.
When I tried to do a fuller loop stroke, the ball would sometimes "fall
off" the blade, but that should keep my technique purer and making short
pips type shots instead of inverted type loops.
The major thing that took getting used to was that the ball sinks in
less when blocking so I started taking the ball a little quicker off the
bounce and closing my blade more. By the end of a two hour session I was
pretty much back up to speed though I'll need a little more work on soft
blocking.
Overall, Joola Snabb is a great upgrade from Joola Tango Ultra and took
very little time to get used to. A great option for those of us who've
used soft and spinny short pips but now want to take advantage of the
characteristics of short pips rather than playing an inverted looping
game with them.
I finally got a chance to try the Stiga Royal short pips. I had earlier
started using Joola Snabb so this will be in many ways a comparison of
the two. Both are red sheets with 1.8 mm sponge and were used on the
forehand side of a Joola Guo 3C blade, a fairly fast, very hard carbon
blade.
Outwardly, the two rubbers are similar, made in Japan with vertically
aligned, pyramid shaped short pips with wider bases than tops. The Royal
has the narrower, harder and more widely spaced pips, more similar to
the original Globe 889, the classic hitting pip.
Royal has a somewhat firmer sponge that reacted less to my one treatment
of Ecolo Expander. Overall feel is harder and the pips play flatter,
more similar to Joola Tango Ultra, but faster. The Royal pips are
slightly heavier than both the Snabb and the Joola Tango Ultra.
I'd say the Royal is better for flat hitting and blocking due to the
lower throw angle but not quite as good as the Snabb for opening as the
ball is lower over the net and not quite as spinny when serving.
At this point I like them both, but I'd tend to recommend the Snabb more
for someone using the short pips on their forehand who wants a little
more spin and the option of looping with them.
Royal seems a bit better for someone who is using the pips on their
backhand and wants to make flat smashes and blocks. You could still loop
with them, but this is not a spinny pip like Joola Tango Ultra, Raystorm
or 802-40, it is more of a hitting and blocking pip.
I'm going to keep using both the Royal and the Snabb and see how they
work out. Both have forced me to play a purer short pips hitting game
with less reliance on looping and more on rolling and flat hitting. |
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