Kristina Dell calls it the little racket that changed tennis:
Today, thin is in. Skinny grips and lighter frames that carry more weight in the head rather than the shaft help baseliners generate more racket-head speed so they can use their wrists and forearms to roll through their shots. Updated polyester strings only add to the effect, as players finish their swings with their rackets up around their ears to get crazy amounts of spin.
“If you give Nadal a heavy racket with a big grip, it’s impossible to do what he does,” said Roman Prokes, part of the team of U.S. Open stringers handling Mr. Nadal’s sticks.
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Aside from treating his rackets kindly, what Mr. Nadal does is put a lot of action on the ball. A maneuverable frame lets him execute his signature lefty forehand: instead of following through over his right shoulder, Mr. Nadal snaps his racket back after hitting the ball. (Kind of like a ping-pong player.) The result is a hyper-rotating spin with the ball jumping high off the court.Rafa’s racket weighs a flimsy 10.6 ounces unstrung, plus an extra 0.4 ounce he adds to the head, for a total of 11.5 ounces with strings, practically pixie dust in the hands of a 6-foot-1 hulking guy. By contrast, the 5-foot-10, 128-pound Caroline Wozniacki, the U.S. Open’s top seeded woman, plays with the same Babolat Aeropro Drive as Mr. Nadal; her frame is just two ounces lighter than Mr. Nadal’s.
If Mr. Nadal picked up Mr. Sampras’s old racket today, his shots would probably hit the fence. The hefty, unforgiving Pro Staff Original Mr. Sampras used en route to 14 Grand Slam titles is 12.6 ounces unstrung. It was already cumbersome, but Mr. Sampras added lead tape to get more power and control, for a total mass of almost 14 ounces with strings. To manage it, he used a grip with a circumference of 4 5/8 inches.
Mr. Nadal’s svelte handle is but a toothpick in comparison: 4¼ inches around, a size smaller than the grip Ms. Wozniacki and many women use. “A 4 3/8 grip was considered a ladies racket,” said Mr. Prokes, “but now across the board players have gone to small grip sizes, at least one size smaller or more.”