For Tennis Parents by a Tennis Parent

I’m a big believer in young tennis players learning how to do all of the things necessary to be ready to step on the court and compete. From learning how to tie their own shoes to carrying their own tennis bag and water bottle, these skills are part and parcel of being a competitive junior player. They need to learn how to keep score. They need to learn the rules in Friend At Court. They need to learn how to wrap an overgrip. And they need to learn how to string a tennis racket.

We all read and talk about the expense of developing a junior tennis player – and I’m not here to try and convince you otherwise – but there are definitely some things you can do to help offset that expense. Having your child string his/her own rackets is a big step in the right direction.

Want to know how much you spend a year on stringing? Click here for a calculator.

Now, doesn’t it make sense to purchase a stringing machine and make sure your child learns how to use it? When my son was in middle school, we purchased an electronic stringer. We set it up in my son’s room, and he strung rackets for himself and others (a nice way for him to earn a little money!). It worked great, but we still had to pay for stringing when we traveled to tournaments. After about 6 months, though, the machine started losing tension and causing major stress. After trying to work with the manufacturer and distributor to no avail, we sold the stringer and went back to paying $20/racket. Grrrr!

I recently came across a new stringing machine that is not only affordable but is also portable. That means no more paying inflated stringing fees when you’re away from home!

The Platinum Pro Stringer is the brainchild of tour player Rubin Statham. On tour Rubin saw players paying racket stringers at each and every tennis event. These tournament stringers had a variety of stringing methods and stringing machines, which meant the players were getting inconsistent tensions in their string bed leading to impaired performance on the court. When the tension wasn’t just right, the racket would have to be restrung, adding an enormous financial cost throughout the year. Rubin and his twin brother spent over $17,000 on restringing labor alone in their first year on tour.

Like many players, to save money and to attain consistent string tensions, they resorted to travelling with a “portable” machine that was the size of a large suitcase. The machine weighed over 45lbs (not sure why they called it portable) and was ineffective at producing consistent string tensions.

Rubin, who is currently playing in the ITF Pro Circuit Futures event in Pittsburgh, tapped into his entrepreneurial side and put together a team of engineers from the US and Korea to design a truly portable stringing machine that was accurate and affordable. After 5 years of R&D and 3 years of testing on both the ATP and WTA tours, Rubin decided his machine was ready for public consumption and is now selling it and supporting it with individualized customer service.

The Platinum Pro Stringer weighs only 4.4 pounds! Fully-packed in its case with the necessary tools, it weighs only 8.8 pounds.  And it comes complete with table clamp, mounting bracket, frame retainers, butterfly screws, flying clamps, power supply and cables, universal power adapter, string cutter, string pliers, and a padded carrying case with room for your string. Oh, and every Platinum Pro Stringer machine comes with one year of hardware repair coverage through its limited warranty and one year of complimentary support.

Luckily for all of you, Rubin and I connected between his matches, and he graciously offered a very nice discount to the ParentingAces community! The Platinum Pro Stringer retails for $790.00 (plus shipping). But, if you buy it through the special web page set up exclusively for ParentingAces, you will only pay $690.00 (plus shipping)! Make sure to enter the special promo code “ACES100” during checkout to get your special ParentingAces discount of $100 off!

Note: ParentingAces is NOT a paid endorser nor do we receive any compensation if you buy this product.

I will be doing an episode of the ParentingAces Podcast with Rubin in a few weeks, so if you have any questions about the Platinum Pro or life on the tour, please feel free to send them to me.

I wish this machine had been around when my son was in the juniors. It would have saved us thousands of dollars over the course of his developmental years! I hope you’ll take a look at the website here, watch the videos, read the testimonials, then use the special ParentingAces link to give this little gem a try.  You can thank me later! 🙂