My Background:-
Now aged 70 years old, played badminton all my life, senior county until 34, then had a break whilst playing squash. Came back to badminton in my mid 50s, been playing Masters County badminton for last 10 years.
My racket for the last few years has been a Yonex Voltric 70, tried the Voltric 70 e tune but found it too head heavy for my game even though it improved my smash.
Have been looking for a replacement for the Voltric 70 for several years, saw Jag’s review and decided to take a chance - I ordered a JNice 4u Black Panther.
First Impression:-
Very useful soft racket bag but not for putting a racket in, will use old Voltric full length cover for storing racket.
As normal I had to take original grip off, put some insulating tape around wooden handle and then put a normal grip back on to give me the grip size I prefer.
On just handling the racket you can feel the difference in head weight, lighter and faster through the air.
Racket shape almost identical to Voltric 70.
Bending shaft by hand the BP appears to have same bend shape but with less effort required, so not as stiff as Voltric 70
First Playing Impression:-
My game is about placement and moving opponents around the court - as you get older you lose the power to smash powerfully, but this is not really an issue with the type of game I play.
On warming up I was amazed at the ease of hitting a deep clear.
On playing games what was most noticeable was how easy it was to defend against smashes, shots that I thought wouldn’t go back over the net seemed to go back every time.
Smashing didn’t appear to be faster but I was getting fewer returns, maybe I was just lucky.
Still not quite got used to driving the shuttle, hitting it too high, just a timing issue.
So my thoughts after playing for 90 minutes
- little effort required for a good clear.
- ease of getting racket head to smashes.
- smashing seems to be more powerful.
- drives not yet perfect.