I was playing with some friends yesterday, and one of them and I decided to trade racquets for the day.My racquet is 3U, med. stiff, and even balanced. His is 4U, stiff, and head heavy.For the course of 3 hours I played with his racquet and smashed a lot (I didn't smash much with my other racquet).Today, I'm feeling pains in my arm a little below the shoulder.Was it the sudden change in racquet and techinique that caused the pain?
i never had the experience before myself, but there are some possible reasons - Stiffness of the racket --> in some cases stiffer rackets can cause the muscles to tire faster because the vibrations are being transferred to your arm much more intensely than that of a medium stiff racket. (may cause your arm to feel tired faster or a little bit of soreness the next day) - head Weight --> Being a head heavy racket, you may have been trying to use the same swing speed as your even balanced racket, in this case you might have been forcing your muscles to play like as if you were still using your own racket. This can strain the muscles in the shoulder thus potentially causing the pain. Hope this helps , if the pain persists for a long period of time i suggest seeking medical advice
I would imagine, yes. I used to play with a 2U stiff head heavy racket when I was young and I often suffer from shoulder pain. Now I use 3U even balance medium rackets and have never had shoulder or waist problem once. Switched back to that 2U racket and had waist discomfort again after 30mins almost every time. I guess it's a combination of player's strength, technique and racket. I strongly suggest you rest sufficiently b4 playing again. If the pain persist, seek medical help before it turns chronic.
I think it is inproper technique. I used to have shoulder and elbow pain after smashing hard. After learning the proper swing and pronation technique, all the pain went away. Using inproper technique with head heavy racket and high tension is a recipe for injury.
What's the tension on the string? If it's too tight and you're not strong enough for it, the vibration will cause pain. I had that when moving up on tension and a couple of pound difference will cause elbow pain for me. Had to move back down to a lower tension racquet to play( about 26). I know a girl using a 30lb tension and she always wonder why the birdie just "die" in her racquet when doing a net drop...
My first racquet was strung at 22lbs. The one I got from my friend was strung at 24lb. Do 2lbs really make a difference?
22-24 is relatively light. It shouldn't make a big difference. You would feel it at a higher tension like 26+ I think....at least for me anyway, going from 26 to 28 and I can FEEL the vibration on the joints. Oh, and it doesn't help that I'm old....er. It's probably due to the racquet balance (head heavy) changes then. As least from personal experience, I have headlight racquets (nanospeed 9000, fast swing, great for double, weak for multiple smashes) to head heavy ( Z-Slash, which I can only use in single, suck dirt as double, too slow), and then I have the Li Ling flame. That's one heavy racquet that you don't feel until the game is over. I think I hurt my elbow for at least 2 weeks from using it. Then again, I already have golfer's elbow. Oh, all that will be fix by doing a bit of wrist and shoulder work out. Physical therapy does wonder... and show how weak I am...
i played 3 times a week and i had the same injury before when i used UC3520 LiNing (flex: hard & weight : 85-89g). so i tried to change my racket to Li Ning N50 (Flex: medium, weight : 85-89g, with HDF technology or shock absorption system)... The pain is no longer there until today. I am not sure it is because of the flex or the HDF technology. But it works !
