Stiga Airoc M Review (updated with review)

Stiga Airoc M

Weight: approx. 68 grams uncut (max)

Hardness: Medium

Speed: Off

Test Blades: Stiga Emerald VPS, Stiga Ebenholz 5

It took me a few days to review this rubber and carefully considered the negative feedbacks from people who have tried this rubber. I would rather be objective on the Airoc M's individual strengths and weaknesses instead of just dismissing it as a bad rubber. I cannot blame other people but it is also unfair to just judge the rubber which I have found some redeeming qualities.

The Airoc M was made due to people asking Stiga to make better rubbers than the Calibra Tour Series. The clamor was for an increased spin when Stiga's newer rubber comes out. I have not yet tested the Airoc M with the new polyball because I am still waiting for Stiga to send me some samples together with the Airoc S rubbers. 

Out of the box, as what I have mentioned before, the Airoc smelled like and looked like it was tuned. The rubber has a reversed dome. It comes with a new light blue sponge which is porous and could be mistaken as an ESN made rubber. The "Made in Japan" label on the topsheet confirms that it is not.

Above and bottom pictures are the close up views of the new porous japanese sponge for the Airoc M. 

Pictures above are the sample rubbers of the Calibra Tour and Airoc M. I took photos of the 2 rubbers together and let people see the differences in topsheet. The Tour topsheet has a mat black look while the Airoc topsheet is a bit shiny and has a different grainy look.

I glued and tested the Airoc M both on the Ebenholz 5 and Emerald VPS together with the Calibra LT Spin for a base comparison. Here are the following things I have observed and I will try to be objective on each attribute of the rubber under testing:

Speed

I rate the Airoc M as fast but nowhere near the level of T64 in terms of speed and bounce. If compared to Stiga's own rubbers the Calibra LT and LT+ are both faster than the Airoc M. The Airoc M however is faster than the Calibra LT Sound and LT Spin versions. I noticed the bounciness and lively attributes of the Airoc M the moment I hit it with both Ebenholz 5 and Emerald VPS blades. When you hit with it using drives, the newly developed sponge which looked like a tensor sponge at first has a very good reaction against the ball when you hit through the sponge. 

Feel

The Airoc M doesn't feel like a true medium hardness rubber. It felt like a medium soft rubber when hitting hard. I would say the approximate sponge hardness equivalent to a euro rubber is  about 45 degrees. The rubber has a loud sound when hitting through the sponge. It sounded different from the calibra series rubbers which have a dull sound with the exception of the calibra lt sound rubber. 

Control

Despite the fast speed of the Airoc M, the control is obviously good for a fast rubber. It was good

enough to control strong smashes near and far from the table. The balance of speed, control and good feel contributes to making the rubber very easy to use even for intermediate players. The control is unlike that of the faster calibra rubbers like LT+ and LT versions which require a little more skill and touch. I can safely say that the Airoc M is a good blocking rubber both forehand and backhand with my preference to the backhand because I love its good feel and control. It's like a toned down T64 in terms of speed and spin but with a softer feel and better control. The topsheet is not sensitive to incoming spin making it very good for receiving serves. 

Spin

This is where most people are most interested before this rubber came out because they wanted something spinnier than the tour series. I asked for a calibra spin rubber side by side with the Airoc M because I felt the Calibra LT Spin is the spinniest modern Stiga rubber. To say that the Airoc M lacks spin is a bit unfair. I would rather judge the Airoc's performance on specific spin-based strokes. Let me establish the fact that the Calibra LT Spin is still spinnier than the Airoc M. I rate the Tour Series as having Average Spin, the Airoc M as having Above Average Spin and Calibra LT Spin as High Spin capability. There is a vast improvement in terms of spin for the Airoc M compared to the Tour Series. The Airoc is spinnier maybe by about 20-25% just to crudely put into numbers. I think many people will like the Airoc M if they do loop drives at peak of the bounce or off the bounce attacks above the table. If you hit more through the sponge when spinning then there is good spin. When you loop on a delayed contact timing or when the ball starts to go down then you would notice that the amount of spin is not as high compared to the first 2 timing contacts. In order to produce good spin you really need to use and hit through the sponge rather than just brushing it with less contact. This is for the forehand loops and spin drives. On the backhand, I found that the Airoc M redeems itself. It is a very good backhand rubber. I let my students block my backhand loops in different timings they say it is much spinnier compared to when I was using it in my forehand. The 2 first early contact timing against the ball still has the same results for the backhand with the late contact on the ball having lesser spin. So I realized that the AIroc is better for speed attacks with more emphasis on speed than spin. That is where the Airoc M shines. I do not think it suits a spinny looping game though.

So I conclude that the Airoc M is a very good rubber. It may differ from people's expectations because of having used to fast and spinny euro rubbers but this rubber is not bad at all. I really need to test this on the polyball together with the Airoc S when it arrives because Stiga says this was designed for the polyball. 

After playing this evening I think Airoc M is probably better suited for harder blades like Stiga's hardwood series blades or maybe a YEO.  These were my impressions:

I had difficulty feeling the ball in many of my shots and even on flat hits the response felt rather dull (but not exactly mushy), almost like the rubber was choking my blade.  The rubber's speed was slow, almost comparable to an unglued/untuned sriver.  Where passive blocking with tenergy would spit the ball back at my opponent with their own spin, Airoc M sort of floated it back with little pace.  My hitting partner was surprised and a bit thrown off by how slowly my shots seemed to come in compared to before.

In topspin to topspin strokes as they were before away from the table the ball would often sink into the net and I had to adjust my swing upwards to get a decent shot (which is expected seeing as this was advertised as having a low-throw).  My backhand punches and loops also had to be timed before the ball reaches the top of the bounce in order to ensure I was engaging the sponge to some degree, and I also experienced a noticeable improvement in control as fewer of my shots went off the table when timed early.  But even playing with early timings, my partner said he didn't feel as pressured from my backhand as he was when I used tenergy because of Airoc's lack of speed and spin, and I did not feel like I could get a solid contact no matter how much I tried.

The opening topspin from the BH is effortless and encourages stronger strokes with more and more all the way brutal wrist snaps as confidence never decreases.

On the fh I could not get used to it and I gave up.

At 52g cut and with a Tenergy 05 max on the fh the whole setup is getting on the head heavy side on a 7-ply all wood blade that I was testing, close to 90g; on a 91g 5 ply it was a dream on the bh.

I might keep reading around to figure whether the 1.9mm Airoc M can go under 45g cut (any clue maybe?); in that case a T05 or 80 1.9mm on the fh would seal the deal (those are close to 45g cut for sure). I'd settle for a 84g TB ALC and basta. I'd be done for good.

This week I am testing another 7-ply wood that felt even more fantastic during a 2-hours coaching session (but I could not try all the shots for good). I sure am full of hope with that rubber.

NOTE: I immediately thought of the Juic Air Condle when I played the Airoc M for the 1st time; it has been years but it felt exactly the same and the Air Condle name popped up right away. They both got that not so soft sponge that feels very soft; weird. also that tender topsheet.