[Tiger-Tim]

Is this true?

Stronger heavier racket hitting the ball harder thus generating far more pace than a lighter racket or can the same pace be gather by a lighter racket?

[jazar]

a heavier racket will enable you to achieve a greater weight of shot as you have more mass travelling through the ball

[slicer]

I agree. Over the past few months, I have been testing out different rackets and customizing them with lead tape.

I've found that the heavier rackets increase the velocity of my serve and depth of my groundstrokes, but it's much tougher to volley since it's harder to quickly get the racket head right where you need it.

With the lighter rackets I can volley, hit great drop shots and nasty cross-court topspin groundies, but my serve slows down tremendously and if I don't take a big swing, my groundstrokes will fall short more times than not.

So I ended up staying on the heavier side, since my serve is my main weapon, and I rely on those free points to make winning easier. Without aces, tennis is hard work

[Bernard Black]

I don't remember achieving a huge difference in mph when I switched to a heavier racquet, but I definitely served much heavier with spin. Not sure of the physical explanation behind it, but I would say kick and slice serves are pretty useless with a lightweight racquet but you can achieve a fairly decent amount of pace. Probably depends more on your technique though, this is just my personal experience.

[gaz]

it will depend on more how you use your body (biomechanically) and speed of the racket head so balance would be more important

[empressdiver]

There are really only two variables to determine the speed of the serve - mass or weight of the racquet head, and velocity of the head as it hits the ball. There are trade-offs to achieve the best compromise for each player.

If your racquet feels good, its probably better to concentrate on the mechanics of your serve motion - flexing your hip, knee and ankle joints during the backswing phase, coiling the upper body during the backswing phase, upward movement from the legs during the forward swing phase, uncoiling through the forward swing, and finishing with a wrist snap and follow-through. Try to use your body to provide more of the power, rather than just increasing arm speed. It will give you more consistency and its easier on your arm as well.

One exercise that helped me a lot with my serve was throwing a football - its basically the same mechanics and because of the ball's weight and size, it forces you to use your body more effectively to get any speed and distance and spiral, so you get immediate feedback by how the ball travels.