Pia Filler hates wood shafts

[overlord]

It's resistant to minor dings. If you hit one too hard or just the wrong way, it breaks or chips and repairs are not straight forward or guaranteed to work. It probably shouldn't happen if you are careful with your cue, but it can happen. I guess the cue being solid has value if you chuck it in the trunk after playing or play in bars etc. It can also have some value to a pro that has to travel a lot with the cue from humid to dry environments, probably. If you fly from Nevada to the Phillipines then to Germany and China, it's good to know the shaft won't warp.

I'm not a world beater at this game and I never will be. The enjoyment is in the playing, hitting the ball sweetly and getting that great feeling you get when you hit the ball just right and the cue makes that wonderful sound and gives you a nice feel in the hand. The soulless, hollow "thunk" or "plink" from a carbon cue just doesn't deliver that for me. Most people playing carbon tend to use soft tips, to mitigate the horrible feel and sound, and that's just the opposite of what I prefer. The lousy feedback also robs me of information about how I'm hitting the ball as a bad stroke feels no different to a perfect one. I feel it's harder to stay on top of my game with carbon.

Filler seems to be doing just fine playing with CF.

Champions win with CF or Wood.

Wood shafts are a lot more work than CF.

CF so easy to maintain.........

 

[Coos Cues]

Pia Filler doesn't play strong enough to know the difference in such minutia. She is entitled to her opinions of course but it's not the gospel.

 

[axejunkie]

I see about as many CF shafts and wood shafts in my shop, so they are far from indestructible. If you go back and listen to the original promo video Predator made for the Revo line of shafts, Pia is basically just parroting those claims, so this is nothing more than marketing in a more personal form. The constant comparison to tennis rackets, golf clubs and hockey sticks is a bit dishonest, as none of these pieces of sports equipment have a high focus on feel and feedback. I think a more fair comparison would be instruments where feel is essential and if you have a look there, Carbon fiber has made very little inroads in the music instrument market..
If you prefer wood or carbon fiber, they both have advantages and disadvantages, saying categorically that one is better like Pia (and Predator) does is just not true. It really depends on what features you emphasis.

You make some good points in reference to tennis and golf. Those sports have ever-present metrics like serve speed and swing or ball speed, which must be on some constant albeit gentle upward trajectory over time. No comparable metric in pool exists. Break speed has been measured but we know it's much less meaningful than those in tennis or golf.