Padel Guide
How to choose an Osaka Padel Racket?
In every sport it is very important to play with equipment suited to your level and
needs. This will not only prevent fatigue injuries but will simultaneously improve your
performance and enjoyment on the court. Our experts give you their best advice to
choose the right Osaka padel racket for your needs!
Before talking about the technical aspects of a padel racket, we should define the
different levels of players and their primary requirements:
Casual players
As your technique starts to develop. You are
best off with an easy-to-play padel racket,
which is relatively light, and offers enough
control to play with precision.
Intermediate players
Your playstyle is not yet fully defined.
You should look for a versatile padel but
with higher grade materials that offers you
a good mix of power and accuracy.
Advanced players
Depending on your playstyle,
you should look for a padel racket with
either maximum power or great accuracy.
A Padel Racket is like a recipe, where the ingredients are:
The shape, the weight, the foam, and the materials. These are the key factors you
should observe for choosing your ideal padel racket!
The Shape (2 main shapes)
Round Shape (Control Frame Rackets)
With a weight balance closer to the handle, round-shaped padel rackets are very
manoeuvrable. Their round sweet-spot is quite forgiving and located in the middle of
the head. These padel rackets provide excellent control, which is a great asset for
not only for casual but also highly skilled defensive padel players. The downside of
round padel rackets is their lack of power for smashes.
If you are unsure of what shape you prefer, you can never go wrong with a round padel racket.
Forehand players (people who play on the right side of the court) play a defensive role
and set-up points by playing well placed lobs and strikes, rather than finish those
points with smashes. This means they will benefit more from round rackets.
Teardrop Shape (Power Frame Rackets)
Teardrop-shaped padel rackets have a center of balance between the middle and
the top of racket are versatile but have a focus on providing more powerful shots into
your arsenal. aimed to make them as manoeuvrable possible given balance closer head.
They will suit intermediate and advanced players who prefer a more aggressive playstyle.
Backhand players (people who play on the left side of the court) play an offensive role
and will finish points with powerful smashes and volleys that apply maximum pressure.
The extra power a teardrop shaped racket provides will assist with these types of shots.
The Weight
At Osaka, we believe that 90% of players out there benefit from holding as little
weight as possible in your hand. This will allow you to respond more quickly at the
net when playing volleys and give your racket a nice agile feeling. It also helps
greatly in reducing the risk of common injuries like tennis-elbows, or shoulder-joint infections.
What determines the weight in our rackets is the material that is used, Osaka Snap®
foam is lighter than Osaka Touch® foam. But more importantly, carbon weighs a lot
less than glass fibre. Consequentially, the higher the carbon content (or the price) of
the racket, the lighter its weight.
Here is an overview of the weight variations in all our ranges.
Pro Tour LTD : 340-360g
Pro Tour : 340-360g
Vision Pro: 345-365g
Vision Aero: 350-370g
Vision: 360-380g
Deshi: 370-390g
The Foam
EVA foam is in high demand in the sports- and especially padel-market today
because of its exceptional qualities and uses. EVA foam is produced by a co-
polymerization reaction between Ethylene and Vinyl Acetate, hence EVA. It is highly
durable and sturdy even at extremely low temperatures. More importantly for padel,
it is able to withstand repeated stress and compression without obtaining cracks and
recuperates at an incredible rate. It also maintains these properties for a long time
and is considered a very resilient foam.
On top of all that it offers these excellent properties in a lightweight package,
making it the ideal choice for padel.
All the above caused us to choose EVA foam in our padel rackets in 2 densities and blends.
Osaka Snap® foam is an excellent lightweight EVA we developed with our
supplier to specifically increase sweet-spot size and help players achieve higher ball-
speeds with less effort. The foam is designed specifically to help you get the
ball back across the net with little effort, this is achieved through the excellent
recuperation rate of the EVA foam, which in turn creates a trampoline effect in the
sweet-spot area. We use this foam in the majority of our range since it is an ideal
foam for a wide variety of players.
Osaka Touch® foam is marginally heavier than its counterpart, but offers some
very similar properties. It was also designed to increase sweet-spot size, but Touch® foam
seeks to offer more control and precision. We achieved this through developing a
slightly less bouncy foam that allows players to place the ball where they want it
from anywhere on the court. Touch® foam is used in parts of our range where we feel
players will be looking for more accuracy.
The Materials
All our padel rackets are built from Japanese carbon fiber, high grade
fiberglass or a combination of the two which we refer to as composites.
Our beginner rackets are built from fiberglass, fiberglass is not as stiff as
carbon fiber making the rackets you build out of it easier to play with, it is also less
expensive which allows us to offer high quality rackets at entry level pricepoints.
Our intermediate level rackets are built out of a carbon/fiberglass composite.
They are not quite as stiff as 100% carbon rackets but they will allow players that
are growing their technical capabilities to get more precision and power out of their
rackets.
Our advanced level rackets are built out of 100% carbon fibre. They are the
lightest, and most demanding rackets we offer. The best players will need to use all
their skills to get the most out of these rackets.
Padel Racket Buying Guide
| Player Type | Kids | Casual Players | Intermediate Players | Advanced off | Advanced Def |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Needs | Agility/Stability | Agility/Stability | Versitality | Power | Accuracy/Stability |
| Shape | Round | Round | Round/Teardrop | Teardrop | Round |
| Weight | <300g | 360g | 350-370g | 360g | 360g |
| Foam | Snap® | Snap® | Snap®/Touch® | Snap® | Snap® |
| Material | FG | FG | Composite | Carbon | Carbon |
| Models | Deshi Kids |
Deshi |
Vision Aero Vision Pro |
Pro Tour Power Pro Tour LTD Power |
Pro Tour Control Pro Tour LTD Control |