Wilson Squash Racket

There are all kinds of rackets with which to play squash, and if you've been playing for any length of time at all, I'm sure you've seen your share of new designs and innovations in squash rackets.

Even with the innovations, most players have their old standby favorite that they can't live without. Some of the standard brands people love are Black Knight, Prince, and Dunlop.

They're good serviceable rackets for experienced and newbie squash players alike. Today's rackets all do have some things in common, though, including a short handle and a nice sized face.

Once someone took out one of the older models and I was surprised at the small face and long handle. It didn't look like it could do very much, but then again the player was great, this was his favorite squash racket, and he beat me soundly.

So I learned my lesson not to judge by appearances. The important thing for me in playing squash is that the racket be easy to control and not give off a lot of vibrational feeling in my arm when I make a hit.

So there has to be something in the handle to migigate the strong vibrations of a ball bouncing off the wall court. I also like a medium range racket, because some of those meant for the professionals can't handle the wear and tear of my hits and misses.

My rackets need to be light, too, as I don't want to risk arm injuries. If you play squash often and play with the wrong racket for your purposes you can easily injur your shoulder, elbow, or wrist, and that's not something you want to play around with.

You won't even be able to play squash for a while if that happens, and certainly it will affect the rest of your life. It's always good to be prepared when you go to play squash. When a string breaks, you need another racket.

However, if you need to use another during a game, you've got to take time to get used to that new racket's feel and performance. I always carry around an old one that may not be so great for me to lend to a buddy whose string breaks and who hasn't prepared ahead of time for this possibility.

I, on the other hand, am always prepared. I carry around an exact duplicate of the one I love and am using. This way, if my string breaks, I just reach in and pull out the exact same model racket from my sports bag.

I have nothing new to get used to, and the game continues! When a racket's string breaks, you can get it restrung rather inexpensively. It may cost you $35 or $40 to have your squash racket restrung.

However, you need to know that every time you bring it in for restringing, the very act of doing that weakens the frame of the racket, making it less likely that the new string will hold and that others won't break.

It's very disheartening to spend that money for a quality job and then have that string or another one break anyway in a couple of weeks. So at a certain point, it's probably better to just give up and purchase a new racket.

If you're looking for recommendations, I'd say to go for maybe a Black Knight or a Wilson. My favorite now is a Wilson N145 with Ashaway SuperNick strings. But I'd say go into a sporting goods store and try some out for yourself. You'll know what feels right.