[Review Experience] VICTOR DriveX 8S

Jayce September 6, 2024 2 0

This is a racket that I have missed out on at multiple times. It was unappreciated at the time I had my heart set on it, and it went through a trough in both first-hand and second-hand prices, but I was short on cash. By the time I had the financial resources, it was no longer readily available.
Thanks to the borrowing and sharing of my friends in China Featherball, it helped me fulfill my dream. Unlike the previous 99LCW, the Harness 8S is a good racket that I totally expected.

Parameters: 4UG5, de-bottomed towel rubber, total weight 93.6g, 6.8mm bellow carbon center shaft, 210mm long, tuned on the stiff side, power hex frame, 76-hole string bed, 9-3 point string groove, 26-28lbs bg66f pull string.
Burgundy color, is my favorite. Whether it’s eyeglasses, cars, earrings or any other object with aesthetic attributes of appearance, it’s easy to render a premium atmosphere by making a burgundy color with a glossy metallic finish, and the Harness 8S clearly does that, but it’s not limited to that. Although all of the high-end models in the Harness series have fluid hexagonal frames, the slimmer, narrower frame on the 8S is more to my liking. And what’s generally considered a cyber-style paint job on this racket, marked by a lightning-like line on the center bar, telegraphs its aggressive attributes – yes, this is an S model, need for speed.

The frame area is in line with the Harness 8k, which at first glance may seem a little smaller than average, but the narrowing of the frame frees up a little more space in the line bed, thus ensuring a large enough effective hitting area in practice. The high color, low swing weight and high swing speed all give the 8s a high impression score. The racket is very flexible, but you still need to get used to the power pattern when pulling against the backcourt, and the stiff mid-range and low balance point don’t help much with borrowing power.
With the high line weight and low weight of the racket, I was initially worried that the feedback would be a bit jarring, but it turned out that the strong core filler worked just fine. At the same time, with the stiffer string, the deformation of the center bar is more clearly perceived.

The TR carbon in the frame gives the racket an overall direct and crisp style of play, which makes it a speedy racket, but it’s not one that spends all of its skill points on speed and agility. Compared to Victor’s own speed rackets, the 8S is still a notch behind in terms of swing speed for the same swing weight, and doesn’t have a very sharp wind break. However, as a member of the Harness series, it excels in directionality and stability. In fact, as the trial process of this series deepens, I am more and more like the fluid hexagonal frame, obviously higher than the previous generation of the diamond windbreak frame has a higher lower limit.
This is a racket that is much more suited to maneuvering around the doubles front court. Admittedly, I can utilize its dexterity to be a good net blocker, with a variety of tempo flat blocks at my fingertips. But sometimes it’s nice to play a little more finely tuned and utilize the Harness 8s’ proper ball-holding feel to snatch rolls and putaways and hooks. This is a racket that allows the receiver to maximize the possibility of fighting for the initiative.

There are gains and losses, and with the lack of head weight, the racket is nowhere near as powerful as the 8K in the backcourt down the line. Although the 8s is very fast, the tail speed also decays very fast, and sometimes when I try to kill the ball hard, it becomes the speed of a normal flat draw when I reach the opponent’s mid-court. Moreover, the ball path can not be pressed down, for players who are used to using the attacking racket, if they still use their usual hitting rhythm, it is likely that they will hit a lot of half-high ball paths, and it takes more time to get used to it. In contrast, this mirrors the remarkable effect of the WES in the Godspeed 90s.
But with the added stability, it’s extra sharp on passive defense. The ability to set up the racket quickly, the ball is dry and elastic, and the sweet spot is regular and forgiving, which makes the Harness 8s have an excellent performance when dealing with continuous downward pressure to get rid of, chasing, armpit, backhand, all-around flexibility. Moreover, the racket picks up and kills the split side very well, and for those players who have a sharper touch of the incoming ball, and can bring a little bit of anticipation, this will be the winning shot.

In fact, I think the Harness 8 Twin is also made for doubles, similar to the Godspeed 90k/s, but in terms of the most extreme performance, the Harness 8s will be a little less impressive. Though the fact that it went cold because the series featured what would have been a smaller audience doesn’t stop it from being a great racket. Victor must have had doubles scene applicable in mind when launching the duo, but unfortunately this fails to stand out from the consumer’s flavor choices.