40: EXPLAINED: The Paddle Weighting Mystery Solved!

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Welcome to 4.0 to episode. I'm Michael O'Neill here, Sunny joined by Mircha Murario there What's up man? How are ya? I'm doing great my friend. It is a beautiful day here in Aspen and on my way back from the courts walking back to the house, I happened to see a deer on the sidewalk, which was uh really cool. Really cool. That is not unusual in Aspen in the spring. You're in a very beautiful place where there's a ton of wild.

Yeah, it's pretty cool. I would prefer not to run into the bears, which I have not done yet, but I heard there are bears along the route from where I am into town, so I've managed to avoid them thus far. So we'll see. When I lived in Boulder, I did have a run in with a mountain lion and I thought it was a dog that was in the middle of the road and then it jumped.

onto about a 15 or 20 foot cliffside in front of the car. And I said, that was not a dog. That was a mountain lion in the middle of the road. So be careful out there. Couple quick things before we get started. Number one, I want to give a huge shout out to Carbon Pickleball. who sent us so much great stuff for our camp in Fort Lauderdale. Hats and paddles and couple hundred balls and ball carriers and all kinds of great stuff.

For the campers. We had this amazing time. We didn't really dig into it too hard in the last episode. I was feeling a little under the weather.

But uh we had an amazing time in Fort Lauderdale. Thank you to the Fort for being so accommodating. Thank you to the twenty-three campers that came out and had an absolute blast with us. And we're super excited to find another venue, which is what this ideas about if you guys have another venue somewhere in the country, preferably indoor if you're part of weather, but we need typically four to six courts.

For three days. And if you guys have a place like that where you live and you'd like to host a camp, please reach out to us at Pickle Help. What did you think of the camp, Mircha? It was amazing. It really exceeded my expectations on multiple levels. First of all, the venue is incredible and they were incredible hosts. Everyone was really friendly and helpful. All the staff was just amazing. But the campers were truly incredible. Everyone was so excited, eager to learn, pleasant.

was really coachable, was open to learning. I thought everyone worked very hard and literally every single camper seemed to improve their game on multiple levels. towards the end of the camp and I just couldn't be more proud of everyone that came and more honored that they really blessed us with their presence for our inaugural camp. Yeah, we had an incredible group. So thank you guys for coming. Thanks for traveling from all over the country to come.

to the camp and we had a blast. We touched on something last week, Mircha, when we were talking about adverse playing conditions and we talked about how In certain conditions, you may want to have a different paddle in your bag that had some different characteristics. And sometimes that can be the exact same paddle, but it's weighted differently. And I think it's really worthy to have a discussion about how to weight your paddle because at the higher levels it's

Somewhat rare that anybody above a four-five doesn't have some version of paddle waiting going on to modify their paddle in a way that perfectly suits their game. It's really interesting that there are a number of paddles that you may think you would like and you try the paddle and you don't love it when it Right out of the box. Yet if you add some weight strategically in certain parts of the

paddle, it can really change the characteristics and open up the paddle, if you will, and make it suit your game. And so this is very individual. I wanna stress that this is really on a case by case basis, both with yourself and your style of game, but also with the the type of paddle that you're going to choose to play with.

But a paddle that you may think you you'd like and you turn out turns out you don't when you get it, if you add some weight in certain sections, it might be the perfect paddle for you, so you might really enjoy it. Most of the people I know will start with the paddle naked. They'll take it out of the box and they'll start playing with it and

They'll start comparing it to what they've been playing with. There's a bit of a learning curve often when you especially if you change technologies of a paddle, where it's gonna take you a month no matter what you do to get used to this new paddle. But I will say specifically in my case, Mircha, I'd been playing with the elongated carbon one, one X for two years.

before the true foam paddles came out. And of course all the reviews came out and said, you gotta check out the two. You gotta check out the two. So I had the one and the two. I hit the one and I thought that's really great. It feels really good. And then I hit the two and I said, man, that thing resets. And it dinks better, but it doesn't have the same drive power as the one. I really miss.

having a little bit more snap on my drives. So I ended up adding weight to the sides. And we'll get into the specifics. It completely changed the tenor of the paddle. And now I find that it's like the perfect balance of the power. and the resets and the dinking that that I really wanted, but didn't come out of the factory that Yeah, Michael, that's a great example because there's one characteristic that you mentioned that you were missing and that was the power.

And with weight, you're able to improve that. Now it can come at a cost, but that's a perfect example of how you can modify your paddle, especially one particular characteristic, to something that is more beneficial to what you want. If you guys ever played a video game or a or Madden or something and you have to build a character on it, you only have a certain set of points that you can build this character with. You've got to allocate points. Some points over here, some points over there.

There's going to be a compromise, which is exactly the same in paddle weighting. If you do something on one end of the paddle, something on the other end of the paddle may suffer a little bit. So it's gonna be up to you to experiment with the different locations to figure out, okay. Is this the sweet spot for me and my game? Yep, exactly. And I recommend that people experiment with this and they try to figure out.

What's the kind of maximum overall weight of the paddle that they can handle comfortably? But not just that. It's kind of where it's distributed because that will make a difference in both the characteristics and how it feels in your hand.

And I think we should d just define a few terms that are commonly used. And the first one is the stock weight. And the stock weight means like when you get the paddle, when you take it out of the box, what's the weight? And it's roughly somewhere between seven point two and eight point five and I'd say most pals are somewhere like around eight ounces plus or minus.

And then the static weight that refers to the total weight of the paddle overall. So the stock weight and the static weight are the same when you pull it out of the box, yet when you start to add lead, the overall weight of the paddle is So just when it's sitting there, how much does it weigh? Yeah, and then you've got the swing weight, which is something that when you pick up the paddle itself and you just start air swinging it, how heavy does it feel in your hand?

Is it quick and snappy or does it have a little bit more heft behind it? And that might help you determine, okay, this might be good for singles or doubles or whatever it is. So the higher that weight, the more it feels like a heavier axe, the more plow through you're gonna get, the more power you're gonna get thinking about. being against the wind or maybe something for singles where you have a little bit more time, but then the compromise will be your hands won't be quite as fast.

It'll be a little slower in hands battles. So again, this idea of a compromise of one to the next is really part of the paddle selection process. Exactly. And the weight distribution really matters. And the most commonly used example said axe, but let's use a hammer. All right. So if you hold a hammer from the base of the hammer, so the handle, and you try to swing it, all right, it feels pretty heavy. But when you

Flip it around and say you are holding the hammer from the claw part of the hammer. All right. If you swing it, it feels much lighter. So that's how the weight distribution can affect the swing weight. And the general numbers are somewhere between 100 and 140, and 100 is really light, so it's really maneuverable and light, feels light in your hand, and then 140 is like really heavy, so that kind of feels slow. So that will affect your hand speed.

Can you do me a favor, Mircha, can you in the like the Twitter version and talking to a a six year old, can you help define twist weight?'Cause I hear it all the time on the paddle review sites and I don't fully have a grasp. Twist weight is really just a measure of like how stable a paddle is and how much it'll twist in your hands.

when hit off center. Like when you're in the transition zone and you're trying to reset and the ball is a little bit off center or off the sweet spot, then like how much does the paddle move in your hand? So that's really the simplest way of thinking about it. There's a lot of technical terms and we can define it further, but really for the sake of

simplicity just think about how much it twists weights in your hand. And usually the numbers are between five and eight and they usually are around between six and seven are the most common kind of twist weights for most paddles. The higher it is, the more stable it is in your hand. So if you hit it off center, it doesn't twist as much.

Does that make sense? It does. Now I was just gonna ask you like is higher better or lower better? So higher is better. Higher gives you a little more stability. Can twist weight be affected by adding weight in certain points of the paddle?

Definitely. In strategic locations, it can definitely affect the twist weight. Higher means it's more stable, so it may think it's better, but it also comes at a cost. So if you have a really high twist weight, it's a really a stable paddle, but it's not as maneuverable. So for example, if you're going back and forth from side to side like in a hands battle, it might not be as maneuverable. Like you said, whenever you add weight, it can come at a cost.

And whenever you add weight to the paddle, you change the static weight a little bit. So that ultimately will affect how you feel in your hands when you're trying to have quick hands or maneuver the paddle really quickly. Would you equate twist weight to air quotes?

feel how the paddle itself feels if I'm swinging through a drive and there's got a little bit of give that I actually happen to maybe I like how that thing gives versus oh man I'm hitting this and it feels like a piece of plywood right out of the box. Yes and no, when you're have a full swing, then you're more likely to feel the swing weight, like how hard it is to swing or how easy it is to swing. And then when you're hitting an off center shot

How stable that is in your hand. The less it twists, the more the off center is gonna feel better or worse. So if it's really twisty, if it So it's got a low twist weight, it's gonna twist a lot, so the off center shots are not gonna be great. For example, if you are a very high level player and you can hit the sweet spot every time, you're not gonna worry as much about the twist weight. It's not gonna affect you as much.

And if you happen to be a somewhat lower level player that needs that stability on the off center shots. then you might want to adjust that twist weight a little bit. So maybe add some weight in certain sections that will help with that. My guess as well is that twist weight is very affected by the construction itself of the paddle. Absolutely meaning if you've got Carbon fiber, it's going to twist less than something like

Yeah, again, it depends on the paddle construction. Generally lighter paddles have a lower twist weight, so the very light, thin paddles very twisty, if you will. So they can have some instability. And that's when you might want to add some weight in a certain locations to help with that. Well there's varying kinds of weight that you can put on a pad.

Some of them are individual little bars that have a certain assigned weight to them, or you can have a spool of lead or tungsten or something like that. And then it's up to you to decide how much. you want to give to your paddle, like how many inches or half an inches based on the amount of weight that you want to add to a certain section of the paddle, correct? Yep, exactly. They have both tungsten and lid. They call them strips or they're these little bars.

So they're about uh two inches I'd say, and most of'em are three grams, whether it's tungsten or whether it's lead. The carbon ones, for example, they're three grams. And I believe they're two inches and they have a carbon logo on them and that is over the lead. So you're not actually touching the lead because as the more lead you're touching, the more toxic.

it can be. So you don't want to be rubbing your hand on on the lead and then eating right afterwards. So you wanna wash your hands, you don't want to touch your eyes. So if you're handling lead you wanna either use gloves or minimize the amo amount of time you're actually touching the lead because it can absorb to your skin. So that's the advantage of the strips that they're you don't have to cut them. They're just or the strips or the bars. You just they come prepackaged. You just

take off the adhesive and stick them on. And when with the spools, you just have to cut them and you have to measure them a little bit. I don't really measure them specifically with a ruler, but I look at where I want them on my paddle and then I basically figure out what length I need. by just eyeballing my paddle'cause I've gotten it down to relative science, at least eyeball science for my purposes.

Yeah, you'll see. You're not gonna feel a lot of a fraction of a gram if you happen to go a quarter inch longer on one side or the other or whatever. By the way, you can get lead Uh, strips or tape, you can certainly get them from carbonpickaball.com using the promo code 402p at checkout if you want to get 10% off. You can also get the spools at pretty much every golf shop in the country.

They're available to just walk in and grab. Certainly Amazon has both versions of them. There's a lot of these. How do I prepare a paddle for a tournament from a lot of top pros and they'll take them out of the box, they'll lead them up in however way they want it. And then very often they'll put some electrical tape around the outside to not only prevent themselves from having to touch the lead, but keep the lead from flying off on the

Exactly. So even though you have an adf adhesive on one side of the lead tape, a lot of times it it can come off, especially if you scrape your paddle on the ground. So you do want to add some electrical tape for the most part. So real quickly, I don't want to get too deep in the weeds on this, but with lead tape you usually have the option of half inch or a quarter inch.

And the quarter inch comes in 0.25 grams per inch or 0.5 grams per inch. I would say do definitely do the five grams per inch because you need to use less of it, even though the strips are relatively long that you're using, you need to use less of it. Or if you're gonna have the half inch lead tape, then I would use the two grams per inch because again you need to use less of it. I personally use the quarter inch because

I like more even weight distribution. So the strips are a little bit longer, but I feel it it distributes the weight more evenly for my purposes. So I like to use that. And with the tungsten it's roughly about the same thing. They have a half inch, like either one gram per inch or two grams per inch. But they're available on Amazon or Pickleball.

central or like you said, carbon has the tungsten pre cut bars which are really, really nice. Or I'm sorry, the lead tape pre cut bars or strips. And by the way, these are do not have to be expensive. For example The ones I buy at Amazon are less than 10 bucks and the spool lasts me, I would say, easily a dozen paddles.

So it can be really inexpensive. So don't stress about it. And the the tape they use to cover the electrical tape, they come in a bunch of different colors and try to get the three-quarter inch if you have sixteen millimeter paddles or thicker and get the half inch for like edgeless or thin paddles.

It's also a good way to gussy up your paddle. You can make it look fancy with a bunch of different colored tape. Exactly. And I use the different colors for the different paddles because now I can just pick them out more easily. Like I've used that paddle for three weeks now, the other paddle I've used for

a couple of days. I have paddles in different stages of use and sometimes I weight them a little bit differently. Like we're gonna talk about, for example, singles paddle might be have a little more weight. So I'll have a singles paddle with one color and

So lifting the kimono a little bit, Mircha, I got while we were in Florida doing our camp, I got a pretty severe infection. And I had a big fever when we were on court. I ended up one of the days running to urgent care for some attention. And I ended up getting a antibiotic called Cypro. And one of the side effects of the Cypro, the known side effects. Is that it can damage or weaken tendons?

And so people can get injured by doing dynamic movement. They tell you you gotta watch out for dynamic movements when you're on this or even a couple months after taking it. So I would love to get back on the pickleball. And my doctor, which happens to be the other guy on this podcast, said what you need to do is make sure you really stretch.

Before you get on the court. And thankfully, I've got the Yobo backpack plus right there in my bag. I'm gonna be taking plenty of time to make sure that my calves, my Achilles especially. My arm, I need to make sure that my arm is good to go by the time I get to the court. I'm nice and warmed up because I am very s right now susceptible to injury. And the best way to prevent injuries on the court is to warm up with the Yobo backpack plus.

Absolutely, Michael. And so what you would particularly want to focus on is the bands and also using those wedges to stretch out those calves. and Achilles. And then obviously you have the therapeutic massage gun. which is just awesome and portable and you can use it on the way to the courts and that really improves that blood flow, which is really what it's all about. Improving blood flow to that area to get it loose.

One of the amazing things about the camp, you guys, is that many of the campers already had the Yobo Backpack Plus. So they've listened. You guys should listen now too. All you gotta do is go to 402p.com slash warm-up. 402p.com slash warm up for your Yobo backpack plus.

And you'll be feeling a little bit better on the court. You start getting those initial dinks going. Your legs are gonna feel good. Your calves are gonna feel good, your arms are gonna feel good. Might as well warm your body up while you're warming your shots. With the Yobo backpack plus. Prehab certainly B3.

So Michael, let's talk about the weight distribution of the paddles and how we're gonna adjust that. So why don't we go over which locations of the paddle that you can add lead or tungsten strategically? For the 20,000 foot overview, the top of the paddle. Like if you were to hold the handle, it's reaching up towards the sky. That is the top. The throat of the paddle is the area between the sides. And the grip. It's the diagonal part of your paddle.

Then you've got the grip itself. You've certainly got the sides. And then you've got something that you actually focus pretty heavily on, which is no pun intended, which is the butt of the paddle. It's literally the end cap underneath your grip. And that can actually be a secret stash for some weighting to really change a paddle's characteristic. Feels like The swing wave.

the top of the paddle, the very top. And this is something that we talked a little bit about last week when you're against the wind or you needed something that really could plow through. Yep, exactly. So when you're talking about the top of the paddle or the head. Adding weight there, so at the top, you can add it at the very top, let's say around noon or so, or a little bit on the side.

that will give you a higher swing weight. So you'll get more power, more plow through, but it does come at a cost. And that's when it can affect your hand speed a little bit. So that's when the paddle really starts to feel a little bit like kind of head heavy. So you might feel it's a little bit less maneuverable. I would say that it it probably comes with the most major cost. of almost any weight you could put on the paddle, that's gonna really feel tremendously different.

Compared to almost anywhere else you put weight on the paddle, there has to be something very specific that you're trying to accomplish. I have experimented with a teeny bit of weight on the top. Like not even those three gram carbon ones, half of that. Just like a gram and a half, just something to change the swing weight, just a teeny little bit. When I add weight to the top of the paddle, it's usually not at the very top. Say the noon.

It's usually uh on the kind of the sides, let's say around one or two o'clock and ten seconds. Like the corners there? Corners, exactly. That's usually where I add it if I add it to the top of the paddle. A better compromise than adding it all the way directly to the top. And that direct to the top one probably comes with the highest penalty.

The sides, however, are probably the area which requires the most experimentation because you can go from the side that you were on, which is those top two corners. All the way to the bottom two corners where the throat engages with the sides and have really different feel.

All the way up and down that side. On my particular carbon paddle, I probably have a three or four inch strip on the left and right side of that paddle, which didn't compromise my hand speed too much, but it really gave me 97% of the power I was getting with the one shape versus the two shape. But that is an area where you can really experiment with more weight, less weight, higher weight, lower weight. Yeah.

And when you add weight there, it adds a little bit of power and some stability, and it really can improve that sweet spot, open up that sweet spot, but it also can decrease the hand speed somewhat as well. So it does come at a little bit of a cost, but not as much as adding weight at the very top of the paddle. And you can think of the hammer again. When you add weight at the top of the hammer, that's what you're doing with the top of the paddle, so that can really affect

that feel of the head heaviness or lack thereof. Would you say that power is on one end and stability is on the other end? If we've got a teeter totter? Yeah, generally speaking. Yeah. Yeah. So as you're If you go to the top corner, you're going to get a fair bit of power. But I don't know if you'll lose stability, but you certainly won't gain it. As you move further down the throat,

you'll gain stability, but you won't have quite as much power. Let's get into this in a second,'cause I want to talk about very often I take a paddle out of the box. And I'll just add weight to the throat. I just know that I want a little more stability. That to me adds stability when you add it to the diagonals of the throat. And I want that for typically transition zone resets. Or if I'm getting a ball nailed at me, I want the paddle to feel very stable in my hand.

Exactly. And if you're a beginner and you've never added lead tape or tungsten tape at all to the paddle, this is really where I recommend you'd start. I'd recommend adding some to the throat and see how that feels. So we're talking from right where the handle just connects with the throat of the paddle. So right around six o'clock and then you basically go to about roughly four or five on one side and then seven or eight on the other side.

So right at the bottom edges of a semi-rectangular paddle, whether it's an elongated or a standard shaped one. Yeah, exactly. And again, this adding weight in this location really improves the stability of the paddle. This is the one where you're really affecting that twist weight that we talked about earlier. It does improve the sweet spot a little bit and it has a relatively minor effect on hand speed. Because again you're you're adding weight to the mid or lower portion of the paddle.

So it's not going to feel as heavy as if you're adding some weight at the very top.

So this is the a good section to bring up the balance point of the paddle, which is the weight distribution. So how head heavy or how head light it is. So in theory, like you can measure this pretty easily. You don't need any fancy equipment. You just basically put it on your finger. And if you can actually balance the paddle where it It stays there, but that kinda tells you about how head heavy or head light it is.

If you're adding weight toward the bottom, that's gonna help bring down the balance point or bring it more towards the butt cap. And if you're adding weight towards the top, that's gonna change the balance point more up on the path.

I almost equate it to how the paddle feels. It's just a feel. When you're swinging it and you hit a ball with it, there's a almost a certain amount of give that it feels. And that to me feels like it's very related to balance. The reason that I bring it up now is'cause one one it's a term that's used, but two, it leads into the discussion of adding weight to the handle or the butt cap.

There's some people that actually add weight to the handle, and there's some newer paddles that actually have construction where they bring the foam all the way down through the handle. And part of the reason for that is to improve the stability and it can affect the balance point. So if I have a paddle that feels really good in terms of how it plays, in terms of the characteristics, yet it feels a little too head heavy to me, one thing you can do is add some weight to the butt cap.

So that improves the balance point and it makes it feel a little bit less head heavy. The analogy I would make is say you have a hammer and it feels really head heavy'cause all the weight is at the top. Let's just say you add a bunch of weight to the handle, to the bottom of the handle of a hammer. It won't feel as head heavy because you'll have a it'll

feel heavier overall, but it feels more balanced, more even in terms of the weight distribution. So you can swing it still pretty easily. This is a good time to plug a very brand new product from Carbon, which is the Carbon X Slice. Speed cap, which is a twenty eight gram or one ounce Cap that you can add to the butt of your carbon paddle and give yourself a little bit more weight down there to counter, no pun intended.

some of the weight that you may put a little further up on the paddle to to change the feel to what you want. I will say that if you only add some weight to the butt cap or the handle, you're not gonna increase your swing weight very much, but if you only add weight there, you might feel some vibration in the paddle. So you definitely want to balance that out with some weight on the throat or the side.

Anyway, I think we should talk about how we ideally like our weight distribution on the paddle. So Michael, what is your ideal weight distribution and does it vary for singles and doubles? Yeah, it does a little bit. As I mentioned before, if I'm playing with the Carbon One Axe

I have throat weight on there. I have I don't know, probably six grams. I probably have one of the carbon three gram thing on each side on on the throat. And then I have the a couple of Three and a half to four inch tungsten strip. on the left and right side of my carbon two true foam. And that to me feels really good. I think that the hard part, I think for someone who's never done this before, is how do you even start? And I think

probably the best way if you can is to have two paddles. And if you don't own two paddles, maybe you can get a demo of the same paddle you have and then start like radically changing. Put a ton of weight on the top and see what it does for a game. Put a ton of weight on the throat. And then once you go, okay, I get how the paddle changes characteristics based on weight, then you can taper it down to the compromise that you're willing to give.

So when you have the the apes paddle, right? That's your the pulse V? Yep. Uh the the pulse S. The pulse V the pulse V is more the standard shape. I have the kind of the hybrid shape, which is the pulse S. So when you took it out of the box and you hid it a bit, how long was it until you were like, okay, I'm gonna have to weight it up this way and this way? Or is that just a regular standard part of how you operate anyway? You know you're gonna be weighting it in some possible

I've come to the conclusion that I like the weight on the throat of the paddle on virtually every single paddle. I typically start there and then I usually add some weight on the sides. And I usually am able to generate enough power or pop on my own or with the characteristics of the paddle.

in the kind of stock weight or with the weight distribution that I'm discussing. So I typically don't add weight to the very top of the paddle unless I'm playing singles and then I would add some weight to the very top. So my standard setup is Where the handle meets the throat, so about six o'clock, and I take it up through the throat and then add some kind of about halfway up the sides of the path.

And that's my typical weight distribution. And then I also add a little bit of weight around the butt cap. And again, I use the quarter inch. lead tape and I use one revolution around the butt cap and then I put my overgrip on it. So we should talk a little bit about overgrips, don't you think, Michael?

Yeah, so I was just gonna say yours is a bit of a war hammer then. You really have a lot of bottom end on that thing on your path. I have a it it feels really even to me. Like I like it balanced. I don't like it too head heavy. Okay. So when you feel my paddle, it it feels it feels roughly around eight two, eight three, but when you actually weigh it overall and by the way you can weight it is just to get a food scale. They're really simple.

And they're also inexpensive. So anyway, my paddle for most people feels lighter than it actually is. It's usually about 87 to 89, and it actually feels more like an eight two eight three in terms of ounce. I would say in general, most companies that make pickleball paddles that are in it, these are the higher end companies, most of those companies are expecting some version of customization from the people that purchase.

So they're gonna err on the lighter side. There are a few people, there's a couple pros I know of that will play a paddle out of the box and they'll literally take it out of the box and play it and not even stick an overgrip on. It's crazy. But in most cases They're gonna let it up a little bit the way they like it. And then they're gonna put at least one overgrip on because it can change the characteristics of your grip strength.

and stability in your hand depending on if you add one or two overgrips to the paddle. Yeah, and one thing that people also notice is that people have different size hands so sometimes a grip might feel either bigger or smaller. For example, if you have a stock grip, so it's right out of the box and the grip feels

fairly comfortable. You need to add an over grips because when you're sweating the regular grip is just too slippery. So when you add an over grip, it's a little bit too thick. One thing you can do is just take off the stock grip, so the leather grip, add an overgrip on and usually if you just add one, it feels

uncomfortable because it's you're basically up against like the wood or whatever kind of material it is, so it feels a little hard. So then you can add another overgrip. So usually in that case you can put two over grips on after removing the original stock grip. Then if it still feels a little bit too small, you can add another one. Another way that people like is the using like the Hes support grip, which is basically this kind of

It sounds like a bicycle grip. Yeah. And it basically adds like texture. So people have to take their standard grip off and they like the texture that it it gives to them. I've tried it and I'm just not a personal fan, but there's a bunch of pros that really like it. So that's another individual thing.

You can even put that on and put an overgrip on it. There's a whole mess. I probably the overgrip show is another show. But I have a question about your weighting of your handle. You were saying that you put a couple of you said two or four inch strips.

On the handle itself? Are they vertical or how do you do it? No, I actually take the quarter inch lead tape and I basically wrap around one revolution on the butt cap. Oh, like all the way at the bottom of the paddle. You do a ring around the bottom. Exactly. Oh that's interesting. And then you just you wrap one or two overgrips on top of it.

A one over grip on top of that. But and I keep the regular stock grip. Something that's cool about that is that gives you a bit of a lip for your hand to sink into because you've got this little Lip hanging out at the bottom, right? That's the other reason that I like the smaller quarter grip version, it's that it's not as thick.

And if I feel I need a little bit more like you said, a little bit more of a lip, then I can wrap it around twice. But I can really adjust it very well. So I feel it it offers the most options.

In terms of adjustment. It can really make a paddle feel snappy. And I really encourage you guys, there's no wrong answer when it comes to weighting a paddle. And you'll find as you experiment with this stuff.

And again, my idea for you is to go ahead and put a four inch chunk on the top of your paddle and go play a game. See what that feels like. Go four inch chunks on the left and right side and see how that feels. Put a big chunk on the throat. And then once you've done all of those positions. Try it and go, okay, here's what I liked about that.

particular thing. Oh, I I really loved the power of putting it on top, but everything else felt really slow and my paddle felt a little unstable because of it. Okay. But then flip it around and on the throat, you might go. I would say most people are going to go. Oh wow, this thing feels better with some weight on the throat. It's just there's something about that is lovely and stable and I don't know.

It feels like you play a little better. And then I think as you fine tune it, you'll start adding some spots to the side maybe or in the butt cap I think is probably like the advanced version of all of this. Yeah, exactly. And the beauty of it is you can adjust it on the go. You basically add a little to the throat. You like that great, leave it on. Add some to the sides, you like that great, leave it on. Add some to the top. You'd like that great. Leave it on. You've done your work.

If you don't like it in the top at the top of the paddle, then you take that part off and you leave the sides on. Or if you don't like it on the sides, you take the sides off. It's really simple and very individualized. It's funny that some of the top pros, like for example, JW.

he will weight paddles like in a million different versions of the lead tape and at various w distributions and he's playing with it constantly whereas Georgia Johnson she just plays the paddle out of the box so it's just stop So it's like she put a grip on? No. Wow. She's she's one of those. Yep, one of those. So same paddle too, probably. They're both playing the frank. Yep, exactly. So also give yourself some grace with this.

you guys, you can radically change how your paddle feels and give yourself a little time to play a few games so you can really get used to how it feels. Don't just play like a game and go, oh no, I hate that and then move on to the next thing. Like really sink into it unless it's really obvious that you're like, oh wow, I don't like how this thing feels at all. In which case, yes. But as you fine-tune this a little more, you'll find that this process can sometimes take weeks.

to really dial in to where this thing feels like second nature in your hand. Yeah, exactly. If the overall weight of the paddle is too heavy and it's hurting your arm, obviously, you know, you need to adjust it. But

But like I said before, if you add some to, for example, the throw it in the sides and it feels a little too head-heavy for me, you can add some weight to the butt cap and that'll balance it out a little bit better and it might not feel that way. The overall static weight, which will be the total weight of the paddle, will It doesn't bother you and then

you have the playing characteristics that you want, then that's what it's all about. It's all about you. It is indeed all about you. Guys, that is your paddle discussion for the day. Go grab a little LALED tape and start experimenting. It can really change and improve how you play and how you hit shots and how you hit resets and how you dink and how you drive and do all the things that we need to do with a paddle. It the control is in your hands to make that paddle feel.

Thank you so much, Michael. Guys, you've now just listened to another episode of 4.0 Pro. As always, picklehelp.com. If you guys have any questions, please go visit carbon at carbonpickleball.com. Get 10 off by using the promo code 402. Check out and thank you once again. 402 P. Thank you for the first time. four point. Tips find us on Instagram at four point. At Pickle Health. But don't forget to have fun.