WTA star player, Madison Keys, has changed her racquet within the Wilson family. It seems to be working well for her. But what is Madison Keys racquet?
Keys recently went out of the French Open 2024 at the hands of Emma Navarro in a tight match (6/7 6/7). But she is striking the ball well and has talked positively about her racquet change in on-court interviews. Andy Roddick also mentioned it on his popular Served podcast.
Madison Keys racquet was a pro stock racquet from Wilson called the H19, with the retail name selling as the Wilson Ultra Pro. This is a low-powered racquet with a thin beam likened to a HEAD Prestige. The H19 or Ultra Pro is available in two different string patterns, 18/20 for more control and 16/19 for more depth and lift.
Madison used the 18/20 version, which was relatively heavy (I’m unfamiliar with her exact specs) and she strung it with a hybrid of natural gut in the crosses and Luxilon Alu Power in the mains.
Madison Keys’ new racquet
The H19 in 18/20 is a demanding racquet. You don’t get much for free in terms of spin and power, but the upside is great control and feel.
From 2024 onwards, the Madison Keys racquet is another pro stock by Wilson called the H22. In retail racquet lingo, this is the Blade Pro.
Since the Blade Pro/H22 has a thicker beam and more power, especially since she is now using a 16/19 string pattern, she has made some spec and string changes.
She has dropped her swing weight by close to 10 points, which is significant and gone to a full bed of Luxilon Alu Power to achieve better control with the more powerful racquet.
Dropping the swing weight makes sense as the H22 will be more difficult to swing than the H19 with its thicker beam. Also, she will probably need to up her swing speed a bit to control the ball better with the open 16/19 string pattern. It makes sense to go for a full bed of poly to increase the control and spin potential.
I think this is, overall, a very sensible change that seems to have worked well for her. It is far from as drastic as Andy Murray’s new racquet, but rather a significant but somewhat subtle change in equipment to get her a bit more depth and height over the net.
Here, you can get the closest thing to the Madison Keys racquet (the Wilson Blade Pro 16/19).
1 comment
The version of the H22 that Wilson sells as the Blade Pro 16×19 is interesting. It’s not at all like the regular Blade. It’s a box beam, for a more old school feel. It has a Pro Staff 97 string pattern (very open crosses, with the first cross over 12 strings, not 14 strings as in the regular Blade). In fact, if you overlay a Pro Staff 97 and the Blade Pro 16×19, you’ll see that the string pattern is identical, or at least so close that you can’t tell it apart. Even more surprisingly, so is the hoop size. The extra one square inch comes from not a larger hoop but the fact that the Blade Pro doesn’t have the weight bumps that take some real estate away from the Pro Staff. So, if you like the way the Pro Staff feels but just want more flex and forgiveness, that’s the Blade Pro. I used the Blade Pro 16×19 for a long time, but as I got older I found that I need a bit more help in the power department. The Blade Pro isn’t a dead racket by any means but it doesn’t give you free power like an Ezone 98 Tour or TFight.