The International Racquetball Association administers racquetball. This body oversees all internationally sanctioned events and the various national organizations as well. The Squash Federation governs squash. The Squash Federation has over member federations, and it oversees the sport all over the world.
Nevertheless, we have countries where one body administers both sports. An example of this is England, where both racquetball and squash lie under the governance of England Squash.
When it comes to a racquetball court, you can play on every surface of the court, including the ceiling. In a squash court, there is an out-of-bounds area demarcated along the front and back walls. There is also a inch high tin strip marking an out-of-bounds area at the base of the front wall. While the racquetball is about 6cm in diameter, the squash ball is 4cm in diameter and has less bounce.
The balls used in both sports are hollow and made of rubber. However, the ball used in racquetball uses more elastic rubber, which is what makes it capable of more intense bouncing.
Because the ball is much bouncier and can hit any surface, racquetball tends to be the faster-paced game. Squash uses longer rackets that have a maximum allowed length of 27 inches. These rackets look much more like a badminton racket, and they have an open neck. Racquetball rackets are shorter and have a maximum allowed length of 22 inches.
The rackets resemble a tennis racket much more than a badminton racket, and they have a closed neck. But also: completely arbitrary, melodramatic constructs that humans have created for the sole purpose of entertaining ourselves, of making our time on this planet feel a little less dull.
And this is coming from a sports fan. Imagine an alien arriving on our planet and observing, without any context, the Masters. Or the Superbowl. Or a sport in which grown people brandish stringed paddles, run around a small, enclosed room, and thwack a rubber ball as hard as they possibly can against the walls of it. Now, think about the fact that we humans have created not one, but two of those sports.
Welcome to squash and racquetball. Because as it turns out, squash and racquetball are two very different things. Squash dates back to , when it was dreamed up by particularly creative English schoolchildren. A racquet is 22 inches long and has a wider, tear-drop shape while a racket is longer at 27 inches and narrower. They have different rules for gameplay and scoring that are important to know about.
For example, serving the ball is different in each game. Racquetball has a service area that you can stand anywhere in, bounce the ball, and hit it so that it bounces off the front wall and then behind the serving line.
Squash has serving boxes that a player must stand-in. They hit the ball to the opposite corner from their box to start. Additionally, in racquetball, you can use the ceiling of the court during a rally while the ceiling is out-of-bounds in squash. Scoring works differently as well. Especially in squash, if the ball hits the side wall first after bouncing back from the front wall, the opponent immediately has got an advantage, to give just one example.
The quality of the return of serve is definitely as important as in squash. And believe me, a really good serve, is as risky as it is hard to hit, than in tennis. The technique might be more difficult but I would say that it requires a lot of feeling to play an ace in squash. The fact that there are just a few aces in the professional squash game speaks for the difficulty itself. Hi What a good take on squash v tennis. I would add that the squash drop shot is much easier to play than the tennis one.
Also tennis players who start to play squash tend to be very good at volleying both forehand and backhand. If you had to pick one person to adapt to both games, it would be the tennis player.
Great article, thanks. It is a good post and I have to agree with Dax on most of the points. It takes a while to adjust from one to the other, especially if you play both on the same day. Badminton is the most demanding and offers more of a hard workout in a short time. Luckily the equipment is light and strong enough to put through the rigours. I, like many others put it off for a decade when told by someone it was fun. It actually is very interesting and can be a pretty good workout.
I have been playing Squash as well as Tennis for quite sometime and my impression is that I love the both but in terms of self satisfaction it is nothing like Squash. I am playing Tennis at national level and Squash at international level, of course for my age group!. Being a fan of both, I think squash is definitely more physically taxing but not necessarily more difficult when it comes to technique.
I avoided squash with the idea that it would negatively affect my tennis game. At the age of 41 I started playing squash. Now four years later I can comment from experience on this topic and your conclusions about beginners Dax. I am now playing a reasonable level of squash and improving in leaps and bounds year-on-year. Shot selection remains my biggest gap having not played as a youngster.
All that said I picked up squash quickly having never played. I have tried to introduce squash players to tennis and there is no doubt its more difficult to learn. As you say rallies of a few shots are fairly easy for even people who have never played either game to do, even if gently.
Absolute beginners at tennis find even a couple of shots difficult to string together. Ball spin has such an important effect in tennis, and almost no influence at beginner squash level. I wholeheartedly agree with your observations. Like you, squash was the last racquet sport that I picked up.
Still play a bit of both. The old knees are complaining though…. Dax, I had Two years at the B and R, this was the host club to the 1st Canadian racketlon event Not in a competition. I do play badminton and TT. I feel that singles badminton is the most demanding one of the lot.
Nicely written. HOWEVER, from my experience playing with friends, a tennis technique is so easy to beat on a squash court, and if you were to force a tennis player to start playing squash from day one with squash technique, then they will have a hard time.
I also think you need to bring mentality into it. Squash rallies are generally much longer, and even at lower levels turn into a game of racket chess. One thing I disagree with is the comments about how the walls make it easier. Yes they do, until you meet someone who can judge length perfectly, and leave you scrambling in the back corner, where the lack of walls would be much nicer. Also, in tennis there are no nicks.
In squash you can be in the perfect position to return a shot, but if the other player hits a perfect nick then you are done. I personally feel that these to game should not be compared. Each game has their own respective challenges, and each game should be equally respective.
As we all know, anything in life is incredibly hard to master. My point is that at a beginner level, a tennis player can keep the squash ball in play while the reverse is harder. With respect to the back walls, it goes both ways. A beginner would struggle with good length shots that die in the back corners, while an advanced player will use the walls to dig it out through a boast or something.
I enjoy badminton and TT as well and understand when you say that each one has its own challenges…. Hi Dax, I suppose the other view point is at what age you start both these sports. My son started both of these sports at 5 years old and has always switched easily between both.
He now plays both these sports at a high level however, he much prefers squash mainly due to the speed and skill level required.
From personal experience, I would say that I played badminton and table-tennis at a higher level than squash and tennis, which I picked up after I left college. If all you want is to play socially and want to learn one of the games quickly, start with squash. If your intent is to try and get good at both games, start with tennis.
Transition from squash to tennis is harder…. If you compare good singles tennis to squash, it is about the same, with squash being a slightly quicker work out — normally 40 minutes vs. No, you cannot use the same racquet for both. Squash racquets are lighter and can break if you hit tennis balls with it. If you use a tennis racquet to play squash, you will injure your wrist.
Singles in tennis is best of 3 sets sometimes a 10 point tiebreak replaces a 3rd set. If the match is competitive, it will take between hours. And yes, this goes for club tennis. I started playing both games at the same time and while squash is a much better workout, tennis is much more difficult to play.
The walls in a squash court allow players to take only a few steps to get to most shots. It is also much easier to keep the ball inbounds on a squash court since you can hit the ball off any wall. Squash is certainly a quicker work out. Once you get used to the walls, they can certainly be used to keep the ball in play.
No such options in tennis…. They are both as easy and hard as each other. It purely comes down to skill level, none of this ball and racquet weight…thats just looking for excuses. I guarantee a high level tennis player would be able to beat low level squash players after a relatively short introduction time to the game, and vice-versa. From my experience I find that it takes longer for a good squash player to get reasonably good at tennis than the reverse.
Would you agree? I would agree. I am a Squash player and I recently played tennis for the first time in 10 years. I could not for the life of me get out of the shot prep habit that I have in squash.
This was the case for the first 4 games or so before I started to get the hang of it. The grip also had me confused. Had I played a much better player would I have had the time to imrpove and get out of my squash mentality? The two games are completely different when approaching the swing, the grip, positioning. I can kind of relate since I went back to tennis after a long break and struggled to win games…. It is not. It is just that it is easier to learn if you are a beginner.
Honestly in my opinion, tennis is the baby version of Squash. And with return of serve. When a ball hits the wall it slows down slightly. When it hits the back wall it sometimes gets too slow to bounce back and practically dies in the corner.
I have played both and I disagree with what you say. Ashton, Thanks for you comment. Some of my squash buddies share your view, and strongly believe that squash is a harder sport to play. My position, specific to this post, is that the difficulty level involved in learning tennis is higher than with learning squash. As for return of serve, if you are unable to volley a squash serve, you get a chance to play it off the back wall most of the time , in tennis, if the ball goes past you, the point is over.
We can always agree to disagree on this…. Im sorry but tennis is not a baby version of squash. I agree with most of the article but not at all with the fitness. The amount of fitness necessary for tennis at a certain level is crazy.
Drop shots are incredibly hard to get to in tennis requiring an insane amount of quickness as well as endurance needed for the multiple hours of tennis.
Another aspect that was left out was tournament play where you play multiple times in a day. And when you get to playing people who hit over mph serves you will realize how hard it is to hit a clean shot to their backhand. You are meant to return serves in squash. If you dont play tennis competitively then you really dont understand the amount of work necessary to be successful.
I had club-level players in mind when I wrote this post. Not a lot of club players can execute a tight drop shot from the base line, or get to one for a decent return. Head to head, I believe tennis is a harder sport.
Especially, when you are learning it. Even at the club level tennis requires a lot more fitness than squash. However, once you start getting into 4. My guess is that your squash level is much higher than your tennis level.
If you play singles at 4. In club squash terms, that would be like an A level. Both games are equally demanding at that level. The difference is that with squash you can get an intense workout in an hour while you need to play at least double that in tennis for the same result.
Hey Dax, Great article. I agree with all of your points, and definitely, squash is the easier to learn. John, I fully agree with your comments. In fact, at the higher levels of the game, like pro squash, most points are won through fakes and deceptive shots. You can get tired watching the never-ending rallies!
Squash you always have to run backwards essentially, and with 4 walls it makes it much more confusing espeically with the multiple boasts that can be played in squash, yes tennis has drop shots which bring a player to the net and a lob, but squash has that as well.
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