Pay Attention to Your String Notching Areas

A little after this post (link), several asked if I could help them spot their ball impact areas and then to optimize their racket sweetspots.

If you cannot find anyone, nor capture the impact on video, one very simple way is to study your string notches. The deeper the notch, the more regular the impact. 

The above picture was shot from the side of the racket, somewhere around 10 o'clock.

The strings have been played with for about 8 hours. All the cross strings were pulled apart to reveal the notches. Regardless of string type, the deepest notches always occur in the main strings between the 7th, 8th and 9th cross for me.

So I know, for this racket with 20 cross strings, my natural bias is to hit the ball a little higher than the middle. This would be one basis for my stringing adjustment later on.

Another way would be to apply some stencil ink all over both sides of the stringbed. Note the ink would stain your tennis balls.

If you could hold the racket the same side up, such that your forehand and backhand are always hitting on different sides of the string bed, you could even study your impact patterns for both wings!