I quite like the TSP Triple series, after having reviewed the Triple Power Chop Sponge, mainly because of it’s very high spin which really appeals to me. I decided to try the Triple Spin Chop Sponge as well, to see how the two would compare.

I glued it onto my Re-Impact Barath blade, on which I had tried the other Triple rubber as well, so I would be able to do some comparisons.

 

TSP Triple Spin Chop Sponge Review

 

The package is shown on the top left, with the following description and ratings:

With this new rubber, the sticky surface of the popular TSP TRIPLE SPIN rubber has been combined with a slower defensive sponge, specially designed for defensive players. As a result, TSP TRIPLE SPIN CHOP gives optimal control for defensive style shots. Due to the sticky surface and soft and slow sponge, extreme spin and spin variations can be produced, and with the 1.0mm sponge offers outstanding control and accuracy.

Ratings:

  • Speed: 6
  • Spin: 10 + α
  • Sponge: 35 degrees

tsp-triple-spin-chop-sponge4

Visual inspection:

The sponge hardness of 35degrees is quite soft, especially compared to most Chinese rubbers. The sheet out of the packet felt soft and floppy. The sheet looks of high quality, which you’d expect from the Japanese-made rubber.

The topsheet comes with an adhesive plastic protection sheet attached, which is not that common for Japanese-made sheets. JUIC makes the only other ones like this that come to mind. Here is a closeup (click to zoom):

tsp-triple-spin-chop-sponge3

 

The topsheet feels relatively soft, although it’s a little hard to feel with the soft 1mm sponge. Here is a side-view of the top-sheet / sponge (sorry, not very good picture!);

 

tsp-triple-spin-chop-sponge

 

The sponge is cream in colour. It’s meant to be a slow sponge, but it felt quite normal, not like those dampening sponges that you find on the real slow rubbers. Here is a close-up of the sponge and markings:

tsp-triple-spin-chop-sponge2

The thickness is actually a range not a specific value. Although other manufacturers may specify a specific thickness, there is always a range that they vary over anyway, so at least TSP spills it out.

 

Grip of the topsheet on the bat

Unlike with the Triple Power rubber, when I removed the adhesive protection sheet it came off intact, and seems a little rigid, so it can be re-used, at least for a while.

The topsheet is definitely tacky (sticky), although not as tacky as the Triple Power. I assume it’s made a little less tacky because of the soft sponge, which would make the whole rubber very slow if the topsheet was ultra tacky as well.

It felt fairly slow when bouncing the ball on the bat, and I could hold the ball onto the bat (upside down) for a few secs before it fell off. This will always reduce after some use as usual.

 

Performance in play

On the Barath blade, which is a balsa blade with a soft feel, this rubber performed really well, and was clearly a better match than the Triple Power!

I decided to devote my whole practice session to this rubber, rather than having a brief hit with 1 or 2 people to test some of the characteristic and forgetting about some of the other ones.

Although the initial tack wore off after a little while, the rubber remained tacky, and even at the end of the session I could still lift up the ball a little.

 

Serving: My regular 999 Turbo is mildly tacky with a soft top-sheet, so you’d expect the spin on the serve to be very good, but the spin on this TSP was clearly even better. I think it’s the dead feel and soft feel of the rubber on low impact that allows you to make faster contact without going long, enabling you to generate more spin.

 

Return of serve: It’s a tacky rubber, so it’s going to be a little sensitive to incoming spin. Making more solid or aggressive contact seemed to make it a lot easier. The dead feel of the rubber made it real easy to control the pace though, and I could add an enormous amount of spin to the ball. Compared to the Triple Power, control felt better and it seemed a little more forgiving. The soft and slow sponge just seem to give me more control as well, so I was very happy with the combination.

 

Looping: Well you can’t expect great looping performance from the rubber with a 1mm sponge, so I didn’t expect too much, even though my blade is supposed to work well with thin sponges.

On fine brush loops the throw was high and the spin was very high! At medium pace I had to make sure I was brushing the ball finely, or the throw would drop and the ball would not clear the net. At high impact the throw was very low, so I don’t believe this rubber is suitable for power-looping in 1mm. With thicker sponges it will obviously be a lot better.

So for an opening slow and high spin loop it’s great, but if counter-looped or blocked hard, it should be followed by a block or hit, as the 1mm sponge will bottom out.

Compared to the Triple power, the performance was significantly better. With the Triple Power the change from high throw to low throw was quite abrupt, likely due to the hard sponge, but with the Triple Spin it was smooth. The soft balsa wood obviously makes a better transition with the soft 35deg sponge, so as I swung harder, the blade effect slowly kicked in more and more.

I got the impression that the spin on loops for this rubber was even higher than for the Triple Power, and the side-spin kick was huge, as long as I brushed the ball.

 

Blocking: An absolute breeze! The balsa-based blade is already good for blocking, but this rubber made it effortless. Against any loop I simply needed to get my bat to it, and it would go back, and I could very the pace with ease. Only for slow spinny loops I either had to close the bat or block through it hard.

 

Hitting: When hitting the ball hard, the throw is really low and it’s very insensitive to spin. Unlike with the Triple Power rubber, this rubber took me only little adjustment time to hit with. As long as I didn’t over-hit, the rubber grabbed the ball just enough to give it some lift, and since the blade has loads of speed you really don’t need to hit at full power.

 

Pushing / Chopping: This is obviously what the rubber is designed for, and it performed really well. I could really load up short pushes with heavy backspin, or take the spin off and return a float.

Similarly chopping loops was really nice…obviously the 1mm sponge was a great help here too, as the control was fantastic, and the spin was really high when I wanted it.

 

Conclusion

This is a high quality rubber specifically designed for choppers, and it allows you to generate huge amounts of spin. Close-in, a pushing and blocking style game would suit, and a faster blade is recommended for more power for flat hits / smashes. Away from the table you can chop loops with great control, and can return then with very high spin or no spin with easy. A thicker sponge is recommended if you wish to loop at medium to high pace.

 

You can buy the TSP Triple Power Chop Sponge from OOAK Shop here.

By: