Something new from Ross Leidy

Model:  Sotto Voce, with Redwood outer veneers

Weight: 89 grams

Handle length: 103mm

Handle material: tiger myrtle (the dark, figured wood); Huon pine (the light wood); rose myrtle (the tiger's stripes)

Handle design: 

When I asked Ross to take on this project, I had no idea what problems I was going to cause him.  I sourced the handle materials here in Tasmania, but it would have helped Ross if he had had larger samples to work with - primarily because using his latest technology left very little margin for error.  Needless to say, Ross coped magnificently.  Secondly I was asking Ross to insert the stripes into a curved form.  I think this is the first time he has been asked to do something like this and so there were multiple challenges for him in designing, milling and finishing my Tasmanian tiger.

My previous sotto voces have both had substantial straight handles, which I have loved but an arthritic little finger has been suggesting to me that something narrower might be appreciated.  The final design takes Ross's anatomic vase for the lower part of the grip together with an almost straight top.  I also wanted to experiment with a fatter backhand grip to see if it was (a) more comfortable and (b) better suited to my backhand dominant style.  The answer to those two questions is... looking very promising but not yet totally convinced.

I have only had limited opportunities so far to test Lily, but initial impressions are very exciting.  The redwood seems to suit my blocking/pushing style.  Someone more experienced and more highly qualified than me might confirm or deny that the redwood seems to be a beautiful timber for a control oriented game; it doesn't seem as fast as my first sotto voce (Huon pine outer veneer) but it is definitely faster than my second (willow outer).

The difference in grip thickness closes my forehand a little which gives me much more stable drives and loops; it opens up my backhand which doesn't seem to be a major issue. One of my club mates was initially worried that the handle would slip out because of its shape, but a few exploratory swishes immediately reassured him that the notch for the second finger secures the hand beautifully.

All - as in every single one - of the people who have looked at and handled Tiger Lily have been blown away by the quality of Ross's work.  While the finish is satin rather than gloss, she still looks very, very pretty and quite exotic. There were the inevitable comments about how the blade looks too beautiful to play with - and yes, I did struggle to put rubbers over the top of the wonderful redwood veneer.

It has been such an enormous treat to work with Ross again.  The man is just so helpful and engaging.  I love his work and Tiger Lily is no exception to his high, high standards.  Thank you, Ross.

This one is amazing..."mona lilly"!

 

I got a galaxy rosewood and I could barely force myself to use it.

Tiger Lily is so comfortable to play with.  She's the best mannered tiger (Tasmanian or otherwise) that you can possibly imagine.  As Ross mentioned, the redwood* outer produces a "woody" feel - there's nothing artificial in how the ball comes off the blade; no synthetic spring or plastic feel, just pure wood.  It's difficult to explain given that both of my other sotto voces are all wood.  What is noticeable is that the redwood sits between the bounciness of my Huon pine blade and the energy absorbing of the willow one.  Result? Control rather than firepower.  Which is probably what I need more than anything else, so I think that counts as a good result.  

Even more than my other blades, Lily works really nicely across the whole range of strokes: slow enough for the short game and fast enough for offence. If this is due to the balsa core of the sotto voce design, then I think I'm a believer in balsa cores!

The handle: Yes, it works!  The combination of vase and (almost) straight handles makes for a really nice ergonomic grip.  I think the fatter backhand also makes a useful contribution to the feel.  I still make some adjustment between forehand and backhand but there's much less sense of forcing the blade to close over the ball when looping/driving.  This handle is by far the most natural feeling shape I've had in my hand: I really would encourage others to give it try.  Having said all of that, I think I haven't yet got the dimensions quite right: slightly longer, slightly thinner, slightly deeper might just do the trick.  

Before Lily arrived, I was using Tuttle Beijing 4 on both forehand and backhand of Suzie.  On Lily these produce great control but I felt were lacking a little oomph (in other words, more spring needed to compensate for the less bouncy redwood).  Today I played for the first time with Xiom Vega Europe 2mm on both sides of Lily, and now I think I've found exactly what I'm looking for.  The control remains but now there's a sting in my attack (particularly my backhand, but that's because my backhand is my most potent shot).

Final conclusion?  This is one happy camper!

*  The decision to use redwood was based partly on its Janka rating and specific gravity - both quite similar to Alaskan Yellow Cedar.  What I didn't look at was modulus of elasticity and I've been wondering if it's that that produces the difference in feel.   Now I do a check and I discover MoE: