The Prince Beast 100 300 tested by Mike! This racket offers solid power combined with a nice stable playing feel and a lot of speed.
Tested racket/specifications:
Brand: Prince Model: Beast 100 300 Head size: 100 sq/inch Weight: 300 gr Balance: 31.5 cm Stringing pattern: 16×19 Length: 27 inch RA: 67 Beam: 24mm / 25.5mm / 22mm Swingweight: 320 Stringing: Diadem Pro X 17 at 24/23 kg
The Prince Beast 100 300 and the 280 gram version are now available in our webshop, including free stringing of your choice!
Baseline:
From the baseline, the 300 gram Beast 100 lives up to its name. This power racket is not that easy to tame! The racket offers a good portion of power, comparable to for example the Babolat Pure Drive , Wilson Ultra 100 V4 and Diadem Nova FS 100. Despite the medium stiff co-polyester string (the Diadem Pro X 17) the racket certainly does not feel uncomfortable, but more about that later. The power from the baseline is therefore considerable, but the fine stability of the racket makes steering the ball easy. You will have to use some spin in your strokes to be able to guide the solid power of this racket in the right direction. With my relatively flat strokes, the balls often flew behind the baseline. So I missed a bit of control every now and then, certainly compared to my previous test of the Diadem Elevate 98 V3 , but that is mainly due to my flatter groundstrokes.
The racket is nice and fast to get behind the ball, partly due to the low balance point of 31.5. This is half a point lower than the competitors mentioned above. Rackethead speed is therefore easy to create and with it the necessary spin to tame this Beast 100.Service:
The Prince Beast 100 offers great service power. Services come through easily and with great speed. I have to say, this little bit of extra power is nice! Kick and slice services are easy to grip, which is also necessary for a 2nd service, for example, to maintain control and margin. All in all, a lot of service convenience!
Just:
At the net the racket is nice and fast and stable, but lacks a little touch for stop volleys and balls by feel. However, the racket is very solid for hard incoming balls and the racket is easy to position due to the good maneuverability/speed by the head-light balance.
Power/control Prince Beast 100 300:
With this racket it is clearly power over control. The racket really houses a big portion of free power. As mentioned before, spin is needed to be able to control this power. Logically, with this power racket you do give up some control. With the previous Beast series this 300 gram version was on a power level of 1200. Oddly enough there are no power levels on the new Beast frames, but 1200 remains a good indication. Fortunately the racket is very solid, partly due to the ATS (Anti Torque System) technology that used in this racket, as is also the case in the new Tour series . So you do retain good, direct control over the ball. This certainly helps with control.
Comfort/arm friendliness:
Even with a 'spicy' (direct) string setup like the Pro X, the comfort of the Beast 100 300 is more than sufficient. Because the racket twists so little, there are relatively fewer vibrations through to the arm. With a hybrid setup or a slightly softer poly or even with a Babolat RPM Blast, this racket comes out even better in my opinion. The first 2 options for a bit more feeling, the RPM Blast to add some extra rotation to maintain margin (and therefore control) in the strokes. But the Beast 100 300 is nice and stable and twists/wobbles little, partly due to the ATS technology. The further material lay-up of Textreme with the damping Twaron does the rest. The comfort is therefore more than fine.
Prince Beast 100 300 bottom line:
Prince has with the Beast 100 of 300 grams a real power monster in the range of the Pure Drive. This Beast is however a bit more comfortable, where a Pure Drive is a bit crisper but less forgiving. Big plus points of this racket are besides the mentioned power the stability and the above average comfort. All in all a strong all-rounder that can be used widely!