It has been a long time since I uploaded something on the blog as I have been accumulating a lot of information for this post. In this post, we are going to review the equipment perspective of China's Olympic Warm Up Tournament which was only played between the Chinese players as a tournament simulation as all tournaments are currently on hold because of the Coronavirus pandemic. We will review the equipment used, the players who used them and analyse the main differences in the equipment used by the majority of players.
The Tournament
Before we start the actually analysis of the equipment, some basic knowledge about the tournament. There were 5 different events being the men singles, women singles, mixed doubles, mens team and women's team.
The top seeds were:
- Men's Singles: Fan Zhendong, Ma Long and Xu Xin
- Women Singles: Chen Meng, Sun Yingsha, Wang Manyu
- Mixed Doubles: Fan Zhendong / Chen Meng, Xu Xin / Sun Yingsha, Wang Chuqin / Wang Manyu
- Men's Team: Ma Long / Xu Xin / Fan Zhendong, Lin Gaoyuan / Liang Jingkun / Wang Chuqin, Yan An / Zhou Qihao / Liu Dangshuo
- Women's Team: Chen Meng / Sun Yingsha / Wang Manyu, Chen Xingtong / Gu Yuting / Sun Mingyang, Liu Fei / Wang Yidi / Qian Tianyi
The winners were:
- Men Singles: Liang Jingkun
- Women Singles: Sun Yingsha
- Mixed Doubles: Xu Xin / Sun Yingsha
- Men's Team: Ma Long / Xu Xin / Fan Zhendong
- Women's Team: Chen Meng / Sun Yingsha / Wang Manyu
The Equipment Used
The most common equipment brand for blades and rubbers are as follows:
As usual, the 3 main brands that were used were Butterfly, the local Chinese Brand DHS and the Swedish company STIGA. The main blades were the classic Viscaria, the newly popular Golden Viscaria and DHS W968 and the Xu Xin Carbon Dynasty among the penholders and the Carbonado 45 among the female players.
First of all, the now widely popular Golden Viscaria was introduced 2 years ago when the likes Fang Bo and Wang Manyu started using it. Many Chinese Players now use it because of its the heavy spin you can generate and it is softer and has nicer feel then the market version Viscaria. Other than the Golden Viscaria, the Lin Gaoyuan ALC was also quite popular in this tournament. Like the Viscaria, both blades contain a layer of ALC except the Lin Gaoyuan has a softer bounce, is faster moving and is better for attacking.
On the side of DHS, the new W968 naturally became the new overpowered blade after getting the approval from the Dictator himself, Ma Long. The forehand has maximum power and can get maximum spin too for kill shots and has a nice bounce. Other than the W968, the similar W965 and the N301 were also used in the tournament. The W965 has the same composition as the W968 only difference being the backhand layer being made of Ayous and the N301, which is a close relative of the W968 was quite popular among penholders.
For the Swedish company STIGA, the 2 most popular blades for them were STIGA Carbon Dynasty Xu Xin Edition and the Carbonado 45. The new Xu Xin Carbon Dynasty is fiercer and the quality of veneer is higher. Because of Xu Xin's use of it, fellow penholders Zhang Qiang and Tao Yuchang have caught up with the trend of using the Xu Xin Carbon Dynasty. The Carbonado 45 is a popular option among the female team with a good feel, nice looping arc and stability, this blade was an upgrade from the Rosewood blades which used to be the go to option for all the female player.
Other options that were used were ZLC blades, primarily being the fast Boll ZLC. 2 male players, Yan An and Zhao Zihao also used the Ovtcharov True Carbon in this competition after signing for Donic.
There is no surprise here in terms of the rubber as most of the players used the National Hurricane 3 on their forehand and some on their backhand. The information I have is lacking on the rubbers used on backhand but I will talk about the main points from what I have.
To begin, the obvious go to option for the majority of the players was the National Hurricane 3 as it can provide a lot of spin, power and stability (when boosted). Only 3 out of the 32 men players chose a rubber that wasn't the Hurricane 3. The first one being Hou Yingchao as he is a defensive chopper he used one of the rubbers from Chinese Manufacturer's Dianchi. Other than that, Xu Chenhao used the relatively new Dignics 05 on his forehand and Xu Xin used the National Blue Sponge Skyline 2 as it is suited better for penholders over the Hurricane 3.
For the backhand, there was a big change in rubber selection. The usual tensor/spring sponge rubber was replaced by tacky Chinese rubbers. Chinese coaches say this is because of the 'lost of spin' when the ball changed from the 38mm ball to the 40mm ball. To compensate for the 'lost spin', many players switched from the usual tensor/spring sponge rubber which only provide power/control to tacky Chinese rubbers like Hurricane 3 and the springier version, Hurricane 8 which provide a lot of spin. Players like Ma Long, Liang Jingkun, Liu Shiwen and Sun Yingsha have already switched to the double tacky setup.
Another big change in the backhand side was that many players were changing to harder sponged rubbers for more power and stronger spin. The most obvious was when Liang Jingkun changed from the 37.5 degree Hurricane 3 to the 41.5 degree Hurricane 3. Other players who were previously using the Tenergy 64 moved to the Tenergy 05 and those who used the Tenergy 05 to the Tenergy 05 Hard or the Dignics 05.
This is the end of this long article and I hope you enjoyed reading it! If I forgot anything or you would like to leave your thoughts please leave it in the comments section. Thank you and don't forget to share and follow.
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