Ok, so there is no other post about this rubbers, so I'll post my review of the Victas 07 Sticky Extra (black, max) here.
So I've been playing with it for almost 2 months now - 2-3 times a week. Mounted on Palio Chop #1.
First thing's first - it's only very slightly tacky.
Second thing. After playing with it for about 8-10 hours I was a little disappointed - it was slow. And I'm used to playing with Chinese rubbers and I know how slow can those be. But come on! It's a 40 Euro Victas rubber with the word "Extra" in it - it must be fast!)
So after about 8-10 hours of play it needed to be reglued cause I hit the table with the paddle and peeled part of the rubber off.
After regluing the rubber was not the same - it was MUCH faster. And till now it's fast and I like it.
I'll try to emphasize on some things I think are important about this rubber:
1. The topsheet is slightly tacky and soft.
1.1. The softness limits you in playing with very thin contact on topspin. It'll slip. I was doing this for about 4-6 training sessions. You can not play a very thin contact topspin with this rubber (for example it's easily done with the Battle 2 or the Hurricanes). You need to engage the sponge more.
1.2. The softness of the topsheet allows you to play some super aggressive and weird pushes and chops. A lot of my opponents say that I started doing some very weird shots (they would mostly use other words
) Chopping is very easy, leaving some sidespins in the short game - easy, ignoring the opponent's spin is easy too. You just need to get used to the feel of the moment when the topsheet bends but the sponge still isn't fully engaged.2. The sponge (when it breaks, or, maybe, when it's properly glued) has gears. As I said - after regluing the rubber it became much faster. But that is only on faster shots. It's still slow when you need it. I would say that it has great top end speed. For me it's top end speed is faster than most of the Chinese rubbers that I've used.
3. The combination of this sponge and topsheet make it really a hybrid rubber. I found out that some shots are better done with a chinese loop motion and some are easier done with an european loop motion. It's like killing a a heavy chopped ball - play it through - like with any chinese rubber. A floater that is falling - engage the sponge, play a shorter stroke more upwards and the ball kicks like it's a tensor rubber. A very interesting feeling.
4. The serve. Personally I love this rubber for serving. But! I use high toss serves - I think this allows me to use the soft topsheet better. My regular sparring partner said that my serves became heavier. And I also feel like I have more control over the serve.
5. Serve receive is good. The soft topsheet allows to ignore the opponent's spin to some degree.
6. The main drawback for some (probably) is the curve when looping. The rubber doesn't clear the net very easy - my topspin doesn't curve a lot with this rubber. Lots of tensors give you a much bigger window over the net, but this rubber throws the ball very low. I'm used to the fact that with chinese rubbers the topspin flies rather low, but with the Sticky Extra it flies really low.
7. The spin is good-very good. One just needs to get used to the combination of topsheet and sponge.
Well, these are my observations about the Sticky Extra. Overall I think it's a really good rubber and I'll stick(although it's not sticky
) with it. I hope the review is readable Also I feel it's quite light.
It just felt lighter after my Tuttle 55A which was lighter than the Battle 2 