This coming July 1. The two new baseboards to be unveiled are the Ochalov Innerforce ALC and the Francesca Innerforce ZLC, both of which happen to be the Innerforce concept with built-in aromatic carbon, emphasizing both the strong grip and the bottom power after powering up. So, let’s guess what kind of performance they might have.
Ocharov Innerforce ALC
Let’s look at the similarities first.
We have experienced the Innerforce ALC, the second generation Innerforce Layer ALC, the personalized Tomohiro Harimoto Innerforce ALC, and now the Ocharov Innerforce ALC. The concept of “ball grip”. The aromatic carbon fibers are placed on both sides of the core, and it is a pure wood feel under small and medium power, with strong ball grip and arc making ability, and only after sufficient power is generated, it starts to stimulate the deep fiber feel and surging Ayus core. For those who originally used a pure wood baseplate, this series is better to get started.
Overall, the previous baseplates in this series are all very ball-eating and robust. It is easy to pull downspin. But with this new board from Ocharov, we also see some differences.
Look at the differences.
The original Innerforce Layer ALC is 157150mm, but the OCHA ALC has been enlarged to 158152mm for a wider sweet spot and deeper feel. For example, the same 158*152mm board surface of Zhang Benji and Innerforce ALC feels meatier and deeper than Innerforce Layer ALC when pulling the ball.
The increase of Ocharov Innerforce ALC is together with the increase of thickness, the thickness reaches 6.2mm, Innerforce Layer ALC and Zhang Benji and Innerforce ALC are both 6.0mm.
The thicker body strengthens the stiffness and support of the board, which makes it more effective in lending defensive power and adding power to the near table. The defensive top plate is also more stable, while improving the sense of speed for straight-line hits and pop-ups. The original Innerforce Layer ALC is suitable for backhand tearing, but backhand foul play is not a speciality, the thickened Ocharov Innerforce ALC is expected to improve this aspect.
We have always said that a thin board is in line with the “light, thin and tough” demand of the times. It is better to start the downward spin and faster to launch. But now that we are in the era of more topspin, a thicker board is likely to be more durable and more stable against topspin. For Ocha with sticky rubbers like Dignics 09c, it should not be a big problem to start the spin. Besides, it is difficult to score directly with single board downspin, more offensive and defensive transitions are the main theme.
According to Ocharov’s description, this racket “has a center of gravity towards the top of the racket”, and we can see that the picture of the baseplate shows a rounded head, which increases the defensive area, and the center of gravity is on the head, which is also good for attacking. However, it may be heavier in weight.