Anna Bright’s JOOLA Scorpeus Weighted-Tape Setup Explained
Anna Bright does not play time JOOLA Scorpeus 14mm in its standard format. Like many professional pickleball players, she adds weighted tape and modifies the grip to create a finished paddle that better suits her game.
The most interesting part of her configuration is where she places the additional weight both at the top of the paddle and along the lower sides of the paddle. Her finished paddle weighs 245 grams—approximately 8.64 ounces.
That combination of extra weight across the top, lower-side weighting and a relatively substantial finished weight provides an excellent real-world example of how a professional player can increase paddle power and stability.
Anna Bright’s Weighted-Tape Configuration
Bright’s setup can be summarized as follows:
| Setup detail | Anna Bright’s configuration |
|---|---|
| Paddle | JOOLA Scorpeus 14mm |
| Weighted-tape position | Across the top and lower sides of the paddle |
| Placement pattern | Top and symmetrical sides—one weighted area on each side |
| Additional protection | Edge-protection tape over the weighted area |
| Grip | Overgrip wrapped relatively high on the handle |
| Measured finished weight | 245 g |
| Finished weight in ounces | Approximately 8.64 oz |
Bright demonstrates her customization in her own paddle-setup video. Anna places a 6 to 7 inch strip of lead tape across the top of her paddle. Since the tape weighs 2g per inch she is adding 12 to 14 grams across the top. The other smaller 2 inch pieces begin close to the throat and follow the curved lower edges of the paddle upward. The placement is symmetrical so the paddle remains balanced from side to side. So she is adding 4 g per side.
Anna Bright's Joola Scorpeus Weighted Tape Setup
Bright also covers the weighted areas with edge-protection tape. This produces a cleaner finished appearance and helps keep the underlying weighted tape securely attached.
What Does Anna Bright’s Complete Tape Configuration Do?
Anna Bright is combining two distinctly different weighting strategies.
The long strip across the top places a substantial amount of mass far from her hand. This primarily increases swing weight, momentum and plow-through.
The two shorter strips along the lower sides place additional mass toward the paddle’s outside edges but closer to her hand. These strips primarily improve stability and resistance to twisting without affecting swing weight as dramatically as the top strip.
Together, the placements are designed to produce:
- More power and depth
- Greater momentum through contact
- A more solid feel when striking the ball
- Better stability on off-center hits
- A more forgiving response across the paddle face
This is not simply a stability-focused setup. The large amount of weight across the top indicates that Bright is also intentionally making the paddle more powerful and substantial through the ball.
Why Put So Much Weighted Tape Across the Top?
Weight placed across the top of a paddle has a particularly large effect on how the paddle swings.
The basic relationship can be approximated by:
I = mr²
Where:
- m is the added mass
- r is the distance between that mass and the axis of rotation near the player’s hand
The important part is that distance is squared. Moving weight farther from the hand increases its effect on rotational inertia disproportionately.
Bright’s 6- to 7-inch top strip adds an estimated 12 to 14 grams across the upper edge of the paddle. Because this mass is positioned close to the point farthest from her hand, it should produce a substantial increase in swing weight.
In practical playing terms, this can make the paddle:
- Feel heavier during the swing
- Carry more momentum through the ball
- Produce greater plow-through
- Generate deeper drives and serves with less deflection at impact
- Feel more solid when blocking or countering pace
There is a trade-off. A higher swing weight can make the paddle harder to accelerate, slower to reposition and more demanding during extended hand battles.
Bright is an elite player with the strength, timing and hand speed required to manage that additional rotational mass. A recreational player may experience the same configuration very differently.
What Do the Lower-Side Strips Add?
Bright supplements the top strip with two shorter pieces of weighted tape along the lower sides.
Each lower-side strip is approximately 2 inches long and uses tape weighing 2 grams per inch. That adds approximately 4 grams to each side, or 8 grams across the two lower-side locations. These strips serve a different purpose from the tape across the top.
When the ball strikes away from the paddle’s centerline, the impact tries to rotate the paddle face in the player’s hand. A paddle’s resistance to this rotation is described by its twist weight.
Placing mass toward the outside edges increases resistance to twisting. The paddle can therefore remain more stable when contact occurs away from the center of the face.
Because Bright places these strips relatively low on the paddle, they remain closer to her hand than tape positioned at 3 and 9 o’clock. This allows them to contribute to stability while adding less swing weight than the same mass placed higher on the sides.
In practical terms, the lower strips can provide:
- Less twisting on off-center contact
- A more stable paddle face
- More consistent results across the hitting surface
- A larger effective sweet spot
- A more solid response without unnecessarily loading the upper paddle even further
How the Top and Lower-Side Tape Work Together
The logic of Bright’s complete setup becomes clearer when the two placements are considered together.
| Placement | Approximate added weight | Primary effect |
|---|---|---|
| Across the top | 12–14 g | Swing weight, power and plow-through |
| Lower left side | 4 g | Stability and twist resistance |
| Lower right side | 4 g | Stability and twist resistance |
| Estimated total | 20–22 g | Power, hitting mass and stability |
The top strip supplies the majority of the additional swing-weight effect. It makes the paddle carry more momentum through contact.
The lower-side strips help stabilize the paddle and reduce unwanted twisting. They also distribute some of the added mass around the lower perimeter rather than concentrating every additional gram at the tip.
The result is a deliberately substantial paddle rather than a lightly tuned stock paddle.
What Does a Finished Weight of 245 Grams Mean?
After completing the weighted-tape, edge-protection and grip modifications, Bright places her paddle on a digital scale. It registers 245 grams. Converting that measurement to ounces:
245 g ÷ 28.3495 = approximately 8.64 oz
This is the weight of the complete playing setup—not the weight of the paddle alone and not the amount of weighted tape added.
The measurement includes:
- The paddle
- Approximately 20–22 grams of lead tape
- Edge-protection tape
- Grip materials
A finished static weight of approximately 8.64 ounces is substantial, especially for a 14mm paddle. But static weight alone does not tell us exactly how heavy the paddle will feel during play.
Mass distribution also matters. An 8.64-ounce paddle with most of its additional weight around the handle could remain relatively easy to maneuver. Bright’s paddle carries a meaningful amount of its additional mass across the top, so its swing weight should increase much more noticeably.
That means her paddle is likely to feel heavier during motion than its static weight alone might suggest.
Bright's combination of top and lower-side weighting illustrates how different placement positions can pursue different objectives. See our Pickleball Paddle Customization Guide for a complete overview of the major weighted-tape placement options.
Why This Configuration Makes Sense for the Scorpeus
The JOOLA Scorpeus has a wider, standard shape rather than the narrower elongated profile of a paddle such as the Perseus.
A wider paddle naturally places more of its mass away from the longitudinal centerline. This generally contributes to greater stability, a larger effective sweet spot and strong maneuverability. The 14mm version also provides a relatively direct and responsive feel. Bright’s configuration builds on that platform in two ways.
First, the large top strip adds the rotational mass and plow-through that a relatively quick standard-shaped paddle may otherwise lack compared with a heavier elongated paddle.
Second, the lower-side strips reinforce the stability and forgiveness associated with the Scorpeus shape. The result combines:
the quick, wide and stable foundation of the Scorpeus
with:
the additional power and momentum created by substantial top weighting.
Bright is not merely adding more of something the paddle already has. She is using weighted tape to change the paddle’s overall balance of characteristics.
Anna Bright and Ben Johns Use Different Weighting Strategies
Anna Bright’s setup provides an interesting contrast with Ben Johns’ recent JOOLA Perseus configurations.
Johns has generally concentrated his additional weight around the lower sides and lower corners. That placement improves stability while limiting the increase in swing weight.
Bright also uses lower-side weight, but she combines it with a much larger strip across the top.
Their strategies can be summarized as follows:
| Player | Main placement | General weighting objective |
| Anna Bright | Across the top plus lower sides | Power, plow-through and stability |
| Ben Johns | Primarily lower sides and corners | Stability with less swing-weight increase |
This does not mean that one approach is better than the other. The players use different paddles, have different physical abilities and may want to change different characteristics. Their setups demonstrate why copying a professional configuration without considering the starting paddle can be misleading.
Bright’s top-weighted Scorpeus and Johns’ lower-weighted Perseus are both examples of purposeful customization—but they pursue different balances between power, stability and maneuverability.
Should You Copy Anna Bright’s Weighted-Tape Setup?
For most recreational players, Bright’s complete setup should not be the starting point. An estimated 20 to 22 grams of weighted tape is a major modification. More importantly, approximately 12 to 14 grams of that weight is positioned across the top, where it has the greatest effect on swing weight.
This could be useful if your paddle:
- Feels too light through contact
- Lacks power and plow-through
- Gets pushed around when blocking hard shots
- Needs more stability as well as more hitting mass
- Remains easy for you to maneuver after smaller weighting experiments
It may be inappropriate if your paddle:
- Already feels head-heavy
- Has a high stock swing weight
- Feels slow during hand battles
- Causes arm, wrist or shoulder fatigue
- Is difficult to accelerate on counters and quick exchanges
The fact that an elite professional can comfortably use an 8.64-ounce, top-weighted paddle does not mean the same configuration will suit every player.
A Safer Way to Test This Type of Setup
If you want to explore the principles behind Bright’s configuration, begin with a much smaller amount of tape.
You can also use our Pickleball Paddle Optimization App to customize your paddle for your goals. It will start with your paddle, ask you what goals you have (power, control etc) and then calculate a suggested amount of weighted tape to add in certain positions.
A sensible testing process for a new weighted tape configuration would be:
- Record your paddle’s stock weight.
- Add equal amounts of weighted tape to both lower sides.
- Test the paddle for stability and maneuverability.
- If you still want more power, add a small amount near the top.
- Increase the top weight gradually rather than immediately copying Bright’s full strip.
- Weigh the paddle after every change.
- Remove or reposition the tape if the paddle becomes slow or tiring.
This approach allows you to determine whether you benefit from lower-side stability, top-weighted power or a combination of the two. The important question is not whether you can reproduce Bright’s finished weight. It is whether each additional gram produces a useful improvement for your game.