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What makes 11six24 pickleball paddles unique?
What should I do if my 11six24 pickleball paddle gets wet?
Which 11six24 pickleball paddle is best for control and precision?
Is the 11six24 actually good or is it overhyped?
Has anyone gotten ahold of 11six24’s newest paddles that are set to be released soon? I love my Monarch all court but I heard the new paddles are going to be assembled differently? Was hoping to know if anyone has compared them!
I purchased a Vapor All Court through the Ambassador drop a couple weeks ago. I’ve been using the 11six24 Monarch All Court about 60% of the time and rotating in the Vatic Pro Saga Flash SH about 30%. The remaining bit is where I try new paddles which have recently been the 11six24 Hurache Alpha1 and the Vapor All Court. All of these paddles have been purchased with my own money and aside from the Vapor All Court, all the paddles have been available to the general public for the same price I paid.
Why am I trying the Vapor All Court when I’ve been happy with the one I own? The previous generation of All Court / Control+ paddles have been discontinued, and the new paddles are a completely different construction. The old construction was a Gen2 Thermoform with a CFC face and standard construction handle, and the paddle was $139.99 before discount code. The new construction is a Gen1.5 with “some heat” applied, a FCC face (fiberglass closest to the core), and a fully molded handle. The new paddle will be $149.99 before discount code. Considering how much I liked the old construction and the somewhat mixed reviews on the John Kew podcast, I certainly had concerns. Other feedback from players that got access before me were “an upgrade in every way” vs the previous construction and “a Jelly Bean turned up to 11.”
The Vapor All Court came in a stock weight of 8.29 oz. My typical setup targets 8.5 - 8.6 oz and to achieve that I remove the stock overgrip, add weight on the sides of the handle a la Augie Ge, and then triple wrap UDrippin Pro grips to achieve a beveled effect for my fingers. At this point I re-weigh the paddle and add weight at 3 and 9 to hit my target. Notable about the Vapor All Court is that the stock twist weight is >7.0 so the weight on sides is minimally necessary. On my paddle I didn’t add any weight to the sides because the “feel” was that it was head heavy compared to my Monarch All Court.
I got to spend 4 hours playing with the Vapor All Court this weekend. The first session I showed up late and got zero warm up time, but I was able to jump in immediately with the Vapor All Court.
I think the user friendliness of this paddle is top tier. Yes you can certainly hit the ball out, but if you’re reasonably close with the amount of power you should be using the ball is going to go where you want it, and that applies to drops as well as serves and drives.
Power and pop in general I thought were very close to the previous all court. Sometimes I thought it was less, sometimes it was clearly more.
Control on the new version exceeds the previous one, probably related to the change in face layup and thermoforming process. Dinks simply didn’t pop up, and you didn’t need to use as much force to get the ball over as a Jelly Bean or a Prism Flash.
The biggest area of improvement over the previous generation is spin and shape on the ball. Serves looped deep, looking like they were going to go out, but dropped inside the baseline at the last second. Hybrid drives seemed exaggerated dipping into the kitchen.
Two areas I struggled a little in the first session were resets and sweet spots. Midway through I had my resets dialed in without popping up, but I’m still finding my groove with the sweet spot as I adjust and the paddle experiences some break-in loosening up.
Within the 11six24 portfolio, I’d place the new All Court in between the old version and the Alpha1. The obvious comparison with another paddle on the market is the Vatic Pro Saga. I think power is pretty similar on those two with the Vapor having noticeably more pop. Control is also very similar with resets and dinks, and I found the Vapor to be slightly more forgiving on drops.
I think this paddle will be good for a lot of people, but the initial PR will likely be overshadowed by the Power series that is releasing on February 7th.