Press release, November 2023

STIGA Sports' revolutionary Cybershape racket - now also for pickleball

The hexagonal shape took the ping pong world by storm when the then still teenage Truls Möregårdh swept the board with the world's top players and reached the final of the World Table Tennis Championships in Houston 2021. He had been using his STIGA Sports brand new Cybershape racket for only three weeks! The racket attracted huge global attention and sold out in record time. The secret was a significantly larger sweetspot and the fact that the edges of the racket allowed you to reach balls from more difficult angles compared to traditionally designed rackets.

After the unprecedented success in table tennis, the product development team at STIGA Sports' headquarters in Eskilstuna, Sweden, began to think. If the Cybershape shape worked so well on table tennis rackets, it should also be suitable for the fast-growing sport of pickleball. That's all said and done. Back to the drawing board and the experts at KTH in Stockholm who helped develop the new racket's shape and function. By the way, in pickleball it is not called a racket but a paddle!

- Do pickleball paddles really have to look like they always have? We at STIGA Sports don't think so. So we decided to break the norm, went back to the lab and tested, measured and tested again. It turns out that Cybershape is just as phenomenal for pickleball as it is for ping pong," announces John Bandstigen, Product Manager Racket Sports at STIGA Sports.

- The outstanding combination of acceleration and control is an incredible benefit of the Cybershape shape. With the sweetspot both higher up and further out, you get a more stable hit and more powerful shots without losing control. I dare say that the combination of speed and control is a unique feature of the Cybershape racket," concludes a very proud John Bandstigen.

Mikael Eriksson is number one in singles and third in doubles in the Swedish pickleball rankings. He has eight SM medals in the PRO classes, four of which are gold. This is what he says about his Aviox Cybershape Carbon Pro paddle:

- "It is a very easy to play all-round racket that provides good control thanks to the racket's great sweetspot!

Aviox Cybershape Carbon Pro is available in stores and on www.stigasports.se from Wednesday 29 November.

FACTS ABOUT AVIOX CYBERSHAPE CARBON PRO

Fast, easy-to-play pickleball paddle with a bigger sweet spot than traditional paddles thanks to the unique Cybershape shape!

Gives you extra control for dinking in front of the net and drop shots from the baseline.

Honeycomb Polymer core makes the paddle more forgiving than thinner paddles.

USAPA approved for competitive play.

Designed and developed in Sweden.

Weight: 220 grams (+/-7 grams).

The unique hexagonal Cybershape shape provides a significantly larger sweetspot than traditional paddles.

The Cybershape shape also provides a larger optimised hitting surface higher up on the blade where most players have their optimal hitting surface. The generous surface is made of T700 carbon fibre with a finely frosted finish. Together with the thicker Honeycomb Polymer core and the total thickness of the racket of 16 mm, it becomes more forgiving than thinner paddles Aviox Cybershape Carbon Pro also provides increased control and makes it easier to slow down the pace in the difficult reset strokes in front of the net (dink game), but also in the drop strokes from the baseline. The paddle's smooth balance and overall weight make it responsive and perfect for net play.

For further information and press photos please contact: Josefine Brögger, josefine.brogger@stigasports.se, 0708 84 35 08.

https://www.stigasports.com