sweet spot

English
WOTD – 30 August 2018

Pronunciation
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If a tennis ball hits a tennis racket’s sweet spot (sense 4), it rebounds with the maximum possible velocity

Noun

sweet spot (plural sweet spots)

  1. Any place that is optimal for obtaining a certain desirable effect or result.
    • 1991 January, Mariam Sodergren, “Private Lessons: Third in a Series: Better Balance”, in Skiing, volume 43, number 5, New York, N.Y.: Times Mirror Magazines, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 113, column 3:
      Here's a way to start improving your balance right now. Let's tune into a reference point, the place on which you can feel your weight concentrated, the spot that will always let you know whether or not you are in balance. I call this reference point the "sweet spot" of your foot. The sweet spot is just behind the big toe and to the side of the ball of each foot (some people grow bunions on this point).
    • 2015, Debbi Rawlins, chapter 1, in Come on Over (Harlequin Blaze), Don Mills, Ont.: Harlequin Enterprises, →ISBN, page 15:
      Shelby figured if the dog was going to bite her, he'd have already done so. […] She found his sweet spot—a patch low behind his ear—and lightly raked it with her nails until his big eyes rolled back in contentment.
  2. (figuratively) Any set of conditions that is optimal for obtaining a certain desirable effect or result.
    • 2007, Arun Sinha, “Growing around in Circles”, in Sweet Spot: How to Maximize Marketing for Business Growth, Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN, page 77:
      Businesses hit a sweet spot—a place, time, or experience in which a company's brands, products and services, finances, leaders, and employees are in tune and in time with consumer neds, aspirations, and budgets—only when (no matter how global, or gigantic, the company) everything and everyone is aligned. Sweet spot companies practice full-circle marketing, which means that everyone must become part of the marketing team.
    • 2017 May 13, Barney Ronay, “Antonio Conte’s brilliance has turned Chelsea’s pop-up team into champions”, in The Guardian‎, London, archived from the original on 9 September 2017:
      Six months old, a half-season project, they are already more watchable and more coherent than the second phase of the title-winning team of two years ago; but not at the level of the luminous, steamrollering [José] Mourinho Mk1 team, a rare concurrence of prime-cut talent and a manager in the sweet spot of his own powers.
  3. (slang, euphemistic) The clitoris, prostate gland, or other center of sexual pleasure.
    • 2008, Peter James, “2 November 2001 [chapter name]”, in Dead Man’s Footsteps, London: Macmillan, →ISBN; republished London: Pan Books, 2014, →ISBN, page 442:
      Then he knelt over her and began to make her wet with his fingers, finding her sweet spot the way he used to, so brilliantly, finding it, working it, moistening his finger from his lips and from herself, setting the fire raging in her now.
    • 2012 September, Shannon West, chapter 4, in Tyger, Tyger, Burning Bright (ManLove Collection), [s.l.]: Siren Publishing, →ISBN, page 74:
      Ragan began to move more slowly once he was in, but soon he was moving quickly, pounding his balls against Donovan's ass, unable to hold back, reaching his sweet spot over and over again until Donovan couldn't keep the screams from coming from his throat.
  4. (sports) Any of several places on a bat, racquet, etc., with which to hit a ball, resulting in the latter rebounding with some optimal desirable effect, such as minimum vibration or maximum velocity.
    He hit the ball with the sweet spot, resulting in a gapper.
    • 1981 September, H[oward] Brody, “Physics of the tennis racket II: The “sweet spot””, in American Journal of Physics, volume 49, number 9, →DOI, pages 816–810:
      The term sweet spot is used in describing that point or region of a tennis racket where the ball should be hit for optimum results. There are several definitions of this term, each one based on different physical phenomenon.
    • 1987, Howard Brody, “The Sweet Spots of a Tennis Racket”, in Tennis Science for Tennis Players, Philadelphia, Pa.: University of Pennsylvania Press, →ISBN, page 23:
      When you hit a shot and it really feels good, you claim that you have hit the sweet spot. But can this feeling be quantified? […] Do some rackets have a sweet spot that is sweeter than that of other rackets, or is the size of the sweet spot the only relevant consideration?
    • 1995, Ed[ward] Turner, [Brent] Woody Clouse, Winning Racquetball: Skills, Drills, and Strategies, Champaign, Ill., Windsor, Ont.: Human Kinetics, →ISBN, page 10:
      There are actually three sweet spots on a racquet's face. Each sweet spot measures a different physical characteristic of your racquet. The sweet spot that most of us think of is the place on the strings where the ball rebounds with the most power, or, technically, the post on the racquet with the maximum coefficient of restitution. The second sweet spot is where the least amount of shock is given to your hand and arm. This is known as the center of percussion. The third sweet spot is the node or place where the least amount of vibration occurs after the initial ball impact. Normally all three sweet spots do not occur in the same location.
    • 1999, Bernard Brogliato, “Two Bodies Colliding”, in E[duardo] D[aniel] Sontag, M. Thoma, editors, Nonsmooth Mechanics: Models, Dynamics and Control (Communications and Control Engineering), 2nd edition, London, Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer-Verlag, →ISBN, section 4.1.4 (The Percussion Center), page 116:
      The center of percussion also finds more exotic applications, like in tennis dynamics: the so-called sweet spot […] is a special impact point on the racket strings used to prevent jarring of the hand. It is defined either as a vibration node, or as the center of percussion, or as the point where the restitution coefficient […] is maximum and vibrations minimum […].
    • 2013, John D[avid] Barrow, “Cushioning the Blow”, in Mathletics: A Scientist Explains 100 Amazing Things about Sport, London: Vintage Books, →ISBN:
      Most of us are familiar with the existence of a ‘sweet spot’ on a tennis racket or bat: the place where it is best to strike the ball. […] Physicists call this sweet spot the ‘centre of percussion’ and it occurs at a distance from the top of a cricket or baseball bat that is about two thirds of its total length.
    • 2015, Thomas Jay Smith, Robert Henning, Michael G. Wade, Thomas Fisher, “Variability in Human Motor and Sport Performance”, in Variability in Human Performance, Boca Raton, Fla.: CRC Press, →ISBN, section 2.1 (Introduction), page 31:
      Club heads [of golf clubs] have weight distributions designed to optimize both launch angle of the ball and minimizing the effects of off-center shots that do not precisely impact the so-called sweet spot (the center of percussion).

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