A long time ago in a hall far, far away...........my coach told me that due to my big hands I would benefit in power and control of my badminton if I had another grip on my racket. With 2 grips on, one the original and added one is Pu Super grip, I have never looked back and would never play with the original grip alone. What do you use? Anyone care to say against it making a difference?
It all depends on your hand-size and your racquet's original grip size. I tend not to use more than one grip for the reason that I don't want to shift the balance of my racquet to the handle. Ever an extra grip can add 2-3g to your racquet and shift the weight to the handle. If i need to change the grip, I usually strip down the old one before wrapping on the new.
Your hand size is also important. It is difficult to buy rackets of a suitable grip size. If you need G2, good luck, as you will never find it. I prefer G3 and rarely find G3. It is easier to buy a G4 and wrap around an extra grip. The balance changes but I find the change minimal and the weight change is insignificant. The tradeoff is a better grip on the racket, and a good grip is crucial for smashing. It is all a matter of preferences and optimizing tradeoffs. Ron
Agree, really depend on original size and what type of grip happen to be used. Some ppl also told me about the same advice, if u need the thick feeling, u can try "double" grip (thin overgrip). Well, never really did that before though, since for my racket, 1 grip is good enough to provide the necessary feeling.
Agree with you on the G2, G3 racquets, they are pretty hard to find here in the States but fairly easy to find in Asia. Although I guess maybe you can specially order one, just have to ask the storekeeper. The change in balance shift ever so slightly and how big of a change depends on what kind of grip you use. If you just cover the original w/ a thin grap, most likely it won't affect the balance a whole lot. Anyway, like strings, this is another technical side of the racquet "accessorizing".
I recently bought 2 rackets when I went to Malaysia for a holiday. I asked the shopowner about G3 grips, and he told me that the distributors usually order only 1 grip size and weight for each model at one time. For example, when the distributor orders MP 77 (which was one of the racket I bought), they will get all rackets with the same weight and grip size. If that order was a G3 3U, then all the stores will have G3 3 U rackets. I suspect that the distributors will tend to order G4 over G3 as the players can make the G4 grip larger by wrapping an extra grip. It will be difficult and undesirable to change the grip from G3 to G4 (have to shave down the grip and the balance will be totally messed up). I could only get G4 with 2 U weight. I like the 2 U weight so that was not a problem, but I had to add a grip to make my G4 a bit larger. Ron
i think there are two factors. it depends on the importer, and also depends on the retailers. i think i remember reading that Canadian and British Yonex orders G3 grips for their rackets. i went to Luxis and looked for a racket for a friend, in their "storage", they have both G4 and G5 in stock. i don't know if they have G3 or not.
I'm confused about this grip size stuff. Okay I keep seeing posts saying that eg. G2 is bigger than G5, so smaller number is bigger. However I've seen Websites (WinexWestCanada's website for one) where G2=3 2/8" and G5=3 5/8". So higher number is bigger. Since there is no FAQ up yet: Which is it? Oh and I have big hands so I used to use two Yonex Grap on my G5 Aerotus 110. Now I use Fleet super soft grip, very well padded, on the 110 and my G4 MP77. And I never take off the original grip.
It depends on the brand..... for Yonex it's like G2 > G3 > G4 >G4.5 >G5 etc...... and for other brands it's different
If you have a good friend who's good at woodworking, you could ask them to fashion a completely customized grip. We have a friend who had that done to thier old carlton since he warped the grip (he didn't change his grip often enough). Just an idea.
To be honest, the length of your wooden vs the original one shouldn't affect the pivot point of the racket by much. If there's a physicist out there maybe they could correct me, but here's my theory: orginal racket [racket head]------------------[handle] new handle [racket head]------------------[new handle] If the shaft has the same length of material in the handle then the flex point will tend to be the same spot assuming you hold the new handle in the same location as the old handle and the wood material are of the same hardness. The only advantage that you may gain by having that longer handle is if you are lazy, or have poor reach, you can "throw" your racket just that little further for that defensive dig.
I see ur point. The flex pt for shaft may not be effected, however, when u gain longer "reach" for the new handle, u may have difficulty to adjust the sweet spot. I mean, with extra length on handle, u r basically switching between a regular length racket and a longer (maybe even longer, since that handle is not 1cm) version. I assume ppl will have some problem to adjust sweet spot back and forth.
It's good to get advantage in further reach. However, on the other hand, won't it present another problem, when u try to defense when th shot is really close to body? The longer the racket, the harder to "bent" the racket and "twist" ur body to defense close shot aiming ur body...
The problem of defending? Not really, it may take a little time to get used to moving the racket up and down in your hand, but my buddies do that quite easily.