Rubber Analysis
By Seth Pech
Recently I have had the opportunity to try out the NEW Stiga DNA Dragon Grip Rubber, Stiga has had their DNA series out for a few years now and I tried the other ones and felt they were on par with other rubbers in their category. I was very intrigued to try dragon grip because of the increased tackiness of the top-sheet which has been a common trend amongst companies to produce and players to use due to the new plastic ball which has less spin.
Topsheet
Dragon Grip is true to its claim the top-sheet is indeed tackier than their other rubbers. on the spectrum of tackiness I think it falls just below a Donic Bluegrip C2 and a Butterfly Dignics 09C but only slightly and I felt that the slight bit less was nothing to stop anyone from using this if they are looking for a tackier top sheet.
Sponge
The sponge on the Dragon grip is definitely on the harder side and takes a bit of time to get used to which has its pros and cons and leads me into the next topic which is performance.
Performance
This rubber in my opinion has an amazing performance, I really feel that Stiga got it right with this one. First of all the throw of the rubber is not low and not too high, think of it as slightly less than say Dignics 09C or somewhere around Tenergy its higher than the MX-P rubber from Tibhar. Second the spin is great lots of control due to the top-sheet being sticky, my serves have more spin as well as my loops, counter looping with this rubber is very easy because the extra spin helps bring the ball down and as I mentioned before the arc is not too high but its also not too low. Speed is not a problem and hitting through opponents is not a problem with this rubber but the fact that it plays closer to a hurricane than say Tenergy or MX-P means that the short game is easier because on soft small shots the rubber doesn’t rebound as much. Durability of this rubber is pretty standard I’ve had mine for about a month and I play 2-3 hours a day and its about time to change rubbers, this is pretty standard I feel.
Well that’s the review on the rubber, I personally play with this rubber now and have no plans on changing in the near future.
