Smart Tennis Training Swing Analyzer from Supreme Tennis Athletes.

The Swing Analyzer comes with some accessories. Among them, for example, a kind of silicone cap with which the sensor is attached to the handle. As an alternative method, a 3M adhesive tape is also included in the delivery. A charging cable is of course also in the package.

In our test, the Swing Analyzer from Supreme Tennis Athletes proved to be very reliable. With the help of the silicone cap, the sensor was quickly attached to my HEAD Extreme Pro, then a quick wiggle and the sensor is activated. The very easy-to-use app, which by the way can be found in the App Store and Play Store under the name “Smart Tennis”, also recognized the sensor immediately and off it went.

In 200 strokes from the baseline, the forehand and backhand were only swapped twice. Volleys and smashes were recognized correctly every time. Personally, I didn’t mind the sensor as an extension of the grip, but I can understand that players who hold the racket very low in their hands have problems with it.

The app displays various statistics with nice and easy to understand graphics. For example, it is easy to see the number of forehands and backhands played as well as the type of spin. During the test, we were very surprised at how comprehensive the app is. It also includes a video and community function, training aids and numerous other statistics about your own game.

Conclusion:

The Smart Tennis Training Swing Analyzer does exactly what we expected of it and surprises with an extensive, easy-to-use app. For us, the best Smart Tennis Sensor on the market.

Swing Vision A.I.

Swing Vision is an app for the iPhone that combines the very latest A.I. technology with the iPhone camera to record your match completely automatically. The genius of it? The app not only records your game on video, creates the statistics known from Grand Slams, but also does the referee for you and tells you whether a ball has landed in the field or not.

Some time ago, you needed a third person to laboriously record your game stats by hand in order to make a meaningful analysis after the match. And once again, the smartphone is replacing that work. Swing Vision admittedly sounded a little too good to be true from my review. An app that does the same thing as Wingfield at its core, but only requires an iPhone?

How does the app work?

Swing Vision A.I. works, as the name suggests, with the support of A.I., or artificial intelligence. The founder is a former Tesla engineer who worked on the Autopilot A.I.. He took the idea of the machine doing the driving and applied it to the lineman. And if you’re going to have artificial intelligence check every ball, why not transfer that data directly into statistics?

Swing Vision is attached to the fence using a smartphone mount, which can be ordered directly. This elevated position makes the recording look like an ATP match on TV, possibly with slightly slower serves. 😉

What does the app measure?

Since the app visually “sees” the entire match or training session via the iPhone, it measures just about everything that can be measured. Stroke speed, match win rate, winners, unforced errors, stroke length and accuracy are just a few of the values that Swing Vision packages into visually very nicely designed statistics. All strokes are classified into the different spin types, such as top spin, slice or flat.

Other functions

All values that are measured are coupled with a video. This means that if I want to know more about my second serve odds, I can filter for exactly that and see every single one of my second serves on video. These filters can also be strung together to get much more specific. As an example, I can activate the “cross court”, “return”, “forehand” and “in the field” filters and see those combinations on video. One feature I would have liked to have on some matches in the past is the “challenge” feature. If you have an Apple Watch, you can view the one shot from the last rally directly on the smartwatch, in slow motion of course, and get the “in” or “out” call from the app.

Conclusion

I was very impressed with Swing Vision, although skepticism was high due to expectations. The app delivers on all promises and did not “call” a single ball incorrectly in my test. The app works so well that already some big tennis organizations, like Tennis Australia, LTA Tennis for Britian, Nike Tennis Camps and the biggest and most important partner ITA (the complete college tennis in the U.S.A.), use the Swing Vision app as an official tool. Looking at the list of investors, you quickly see some big names like Andy Roddick or James Blake, who are well versed in the tennis world and know what it needs. Swing Vision is really too good to be true and gets an absolute recommendation from me! There is also a 30-day trial version that is definitely worth it and you can get it here.

What it measures

Despite having a lot of different stats, the app is easy to use and is actually self-explanatory.

Babolat Play measures the power of your shots by recording the speed of your racquet head and how much spin you generate on your shots compared to the top 20 ATP pros.

The app also plots a virtual racket head and shows the percentage of balls hit in each area of the stringbed. So you can clearly see how often you really hit the sweet spot!

The integrated device also tracks what spin you’re hitting, whether topspin, slice or a board. This can be surprising to some players who hit the ball flat more often than they expect!

Some players will be surprised at how often they hit the ball rather flat and without topspin, providing an explanation for all the balls in the net and lack of length. You can identify your own game very well from this data.

One feature that hooked me and got me hooked is the speed measurement of serve and forehand. Since the app makes a comparison to the ATP’s top-20 players here, you have to really step on the gas to even come close to the top-20’s values.

The limitations of Babolat Play

With all the benefits and ingenious features that Babolat Play brings, it’s surprising why we don’t see only tennis racquets with integrated sensors at every tournament. Despite the important data, why hasn’t Babolat Play caught on and why haven’t the other racquet manufacturers followed suit and released their own integrated sensors?

Originally, it looked like Babolat would release every single one of their racquets in a Play sensor variant as well over the next few years. However, we’ve been hearing next to nothing about this technology for some time now.

The Babolat Play tennis rackets are simply too expensive and the sensor technology is clearly outdated compared to the clip-on sensors.

Conclusion

The Babolat Play is a useful device for recording your tennis data, which can give you valuable insights into your game. Recording and analyzing your data can help you understand your game and improve it more easily.

The Babolat Play is an ingenious sensor to determine important data of your tennis game. The pioneer of tennis sensors! However, I recommend buying a Babolat Play racket only if you can get it very cheap (under 80$ sounds like a good deal). Compared to other sensors, such as the STA 4.0, a Babolat Play racket at full price just isn’t worth it these days.

Spivo

Spivo is a completely different type of tennis sensor. It does not work electronically, but manually through very simple physics. Spivo is attached to the racket like a damper and produces a whistle when the racket is moved by the wind. The trick, however, is that this whistle is only generated at a certain club speed and angle of the clubface in relation to the swing path. The louder and clearer the whistle sounds from your club, the more topspin your ball has.

What is the goal of Spivo?

I’m a big fan of the idea because I play a lot of topspin myself and I always advise beginners and advanced players who want to improve their game to play more topspin. Many misses can be corrected by topspin as if by itself. With more topspin, the self-confidence in one’s own strokes increases, because the error rate decreases and very important strokes such as the forehand short-cross.

Spivo Varinten

There are two different Spivo variants available for purchase. Once the Spivo One for children with low speed, which produces a quiet sound and the Spivo Two for adults who want to have really a lot of speed and topspin.

The problem

Especially with fast strokes, most players tend to do without topspin completely and hit a straight “board”. With Spivo, you get instant audible feedback on your stroke and can immediately tell if your follow-through forehand has enough topspin. The goal, of course, is to eventually have a feel for the amount of topspin without Spivo, and it works pretty well.

Conclusion

Spivo obviously can’t compete with a tennis sensor with an app in terms of measuring data and creating statistics. But Spivo doesn’t have to, as it represents rather the minimalist, but promising variant for a very important area. The development and perfection of the absolutely essential basics.