Word: rackets
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...meat, either raw or cooked. The transition to cooking may have had social implications as well. Wrangham argues that the control of the flame gave rise to traditional gender roles, as cooked food became a valuable commodity. “The possibility of [food] theft prompted a primitive protection racket in which women are protected and men get the advantage of being fed,” he said. In previous research, Wrangham studied chimpanzees, even working with famous primatologist Jane Goodall in Tanzania. “They are a good model for human ancestors 6 to 7 million years...
...Inch that Changed Tennis Forever," Rod Cross, a physics professor at the University of Sydney, argued that the innovation in equipment that transformed topspin from a looping, defensive shot into a dive-bombing, offensive play actually happened in the late 1970s, when equipment makers widened the heads of professional rackets from nine inches to 10 (they also dropped wood for metal and eventually graphite). The extra inch allowed players to tilt the racket forward and swing from low to high without worrying about clipping the edge of the frame when brushing up on the ball...
According to Cross, nothing much has changed since that innovation; it's only in the last 10 years that players have developed the physique and technique to take advantage of the extra width by whipping the racket up in a motion that generates about five times more spin than the ground strokes players were hitting in the 1970s. "Players were given an inch in the 1970s and they took a mile," he says...
Pinpointing the role equipment has played in tennis's evolution can be tricky, however. Conventional wisdom once held that more powerful racket frames led to the hard-serving power game of the late '90s. But a 1997 test by Tennis Magazine found that 6 ft. 5 in. (1.96 m) Australian Mark Philippoussis served at an average speed of 124 m.p.h. (200 km/h) with his own graphite racket, and an only slightly slower 122 m.p.h. (196 km/h) with a classic wooden racket...
...even as strings offer greater potential for spin, players need technique to fulfill that potential. As Miller says, "the most important factor in the generation of spin is racket speed." Research by Cross at the University of Sydney has shown that pro tennis players have much less feel for strings than they think, and tend to overestimate their importance. A study published last year found that 90% of professionals could not feel a 6 lb. (2.7 kg) difference in the tension of strings in two different frames - even though most professionals insist on exacting string specifications for their matches...