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zanetti-equipment-report

My cue Passione with the S20 shaft is just the best product that Longoni has ever produced for me. Telling this I don't want absolutely to discriminate the rest of the range of shafts since every player has his own natural growth process.
I have played for about 10 years with the PRO2+ shaft which is the most flexible of the range, the one which gives more control and elevated rotations. I won two world titles with this shaft.
Then, my technical and development process, brought me to the use of a bigger and more rigid shaft and therefore I switched to the shaft PRO4. A bit less "spin", balanced on the other hand, from the power of my arm, but also less defection; in this way I could hit the ball number 2 with more precision without too many margins on the line of the cue ball towards the other one.
With the PRO4 shaft I have played for some years, winning the Crystal Kelly tournament and a world silver medal, besides many national and international team titles.

 
passione-eart lr

Then I started testing a new revolutionary shaft, a laminated 20 maple slides shaft and I was immediately impressed by its solidity and from its always predictable reactions. This new wood laminated structure stops always the shaft' s vibrations during the shot and therefore these vibrations don't affect my arm. Also in this case because of a personal choice, I prefer the conic profile, the more rigid one, but I repeat, it is just a personal choice.

I have friends who are big collectors and cues' experts who find the shafts with the (E)iffel profile the best ones overall with which they have ever played. I respect their opinions since some choices are just subjective such as the ones of the cue tip. Some players prefer the soft cue tip, some others the hard cue tip. I prefer the hard tips, provided that they have a good grip.

 

passione-nera lr

Nowadays, a lot of players ask me for a suggestion because they want to change their PRO2+ shaft and to use my conic shafts. I deeply advise them against doing that because there is really a huge difference between these two shafts that are one opposite to the other as far as the flexibility offered from the wide Longoni range of shafts is concerned. It is something that must be done gradually. A player who plays since years with a PRO2+ shaft is used to compensate deflection in a certain way; therefore, if he starts playing with the more rigid shaft, probably he could no more hit the balls as he think. 

Therefore my suggestion is to switch to a laminated shaft with an (E)iffel profile which is already more rigid because of its nature, but that keeps certain flexibility features and offers at the same time all the advantages of the laminated shaft, especially for what concerns the reduction of the vibrations, absorbed by the shaft's structure.

s20 e71 vp2

If, on the contrary, a player wants to test a more rigid shaft, also keeping an eye on the wallet, I really suggest the PRO4 shaft, appreciated by a lot of famous world players who keep on using it. The deflection will be less and in preparing the shot, you will have to go closer to the straight line between the cue ball and second one, obviously for the effect shots.
As far as the joint is concerned, I prefer the wood since I feel it more homogeneous and linear in comparison to the metallic joint, above all when the VP2 joint was in brass and the female was also a lit bit heavy. Therefore I always felt a certain weight near the middle of the cue that I didn't like. Now, I have to say that with the female insert in ergal ( a special kind of aluminium) and the male in titanium ( grade 5 ) we reached a perfect balance of the weights and when I test it, I am really satisfied. I have at home a cue Emozione with VP2-T joint, sometimes I play with it and I don't feel any difference more. Now, I think that my preference for the wooden joint is more something psychological than technical, but in this matter I am traditionalist and the relation shaft-butt offered by the wooden joint still remains for me the top.
During the years we worked also in order to improve the quality of the wooden joint, its thread remained unchanged,but now it is more constant and even more precise than before.
I would like to point out that I don't give any importance to an eventual gaps that there could be between the shaft and butt's junction since on the playing side nothing changes. I only try to fix always in the strongest way the shaft.