This technical note examined the effect of ball mass and smoothing protocol on the magnitude and timing of peak horizontal velocity of the racket in the tennis forehand. A skilled tennis player stroked ten forehands using three different tennis balls (regular, added mass, foam). Kinematic data were smoothed through impact and interpolating impact. Factorial ANOVA showed a significant main effect for smoothing on the peak racket velocity, but nonsignificant effects for ball mass or the interaction of mass and smoothing. Smoothing protocol had a large (ε~2 = 0.49) effect on peak racket velocity at impact. Ball mass had a significant effect on the timing of peak racket velocity (ε~2 = 0.33) if position data were smoothed through impact. The results confirmed recent studies that sport implement velocities near impact can be distorted by smoothing through impact and the mass of the ball being struck. Studies of striking implement velocities near impact require special data smoothing protocols.
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