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Bordentown, NJ — Prince, a global leader in performance tennis equipment, announces the arrival of Lightspeed footwear for competitive players. Designed to be lower, lighter and faster, Lightspeed models feature sleek silhouettes on a low-profile platform that keeps a player’s center of gravity low for enhanced balance, agility and responsiveness on the court. The new shoes, which hit shelves globally beginning in February, debuted Monday at the 2010 Australian Open on the feet of Marcel Granollers, who raced around the court in the new shoes during his five-set, first round upset of No. 8 seed Robin Soderling.

“What a great way to introduce these shoes,” said Steve Davis, VP or Product Development at Prince. “To have the first player ever to lace these up in a Grand Slam go out and move the way he did and pull off that upset is not a bad start.”

In addition to Granollers, there are seven other men and two women in the 2010 Australian Open main draws who have already converted to Lightspeed. On the men’s side, in addition to Granollers, fans will see Albert Montanes, Santiago Ventura, Rik DeVoest, Julien Rojer, Martin Damm, Filip Polasek and Johan Brunstrom wearing the Rebel LS. On the women’s side, Kveta Peschke and Yvonne Meusburger will be sporting the new Poise LS.

“We broke away from the mold of conventional tennis shoe design to give players a lightweight, ultra-responsive match-day shoe,” said Jerome Jackson, Global Product Manager for Footwear at Prince. “We are excited to make Lightspeed footwear available to competitive players around the world.”

A key feature in Lightspeed is its Propulsion Plate – a lightweight chassis built to transfer energy fluidly from the heel to the forefoot, resulting in quicker reaction time, better acceleration, and a sense of being ‘on the balls of your feet’. In addition, each shoe features an ultra-low profile midsole, giving players a much lower platform for better stability as well as Prince’s Shock Eraser Pro heel insert to deliver maximum impact protection.

Lightspeed will be available in two models – the Rebel LS for men and the Poise LS for women. Both models will hit shelves in the United States on February 15, 2010. The Rebel LS will be available in three colorways including Yellow/Black/Silver to ‘hook up’ with the popular EXO3 Rebel 95 racquet, Black/White/Green to ‘hook up’ with the EXO3 Graphite racquet, and White/Navy/Silver for a more traditional colorway. The Poise LS will be available in White/Silver/Neon and features the same technology platform as the men’s Rebel LS but has a distinct upper design built specifically to appeal to female players.

Lightspeed replaces the O-Series as the new flagship model in Prince’s ‘All-Court’ series -one of the three segments in the Company’s footwear line along with ‘Grinder’ and ‘Traditionalist’. Models in the ‘All-Court’ series are designed for the all-around player interested in lightweight performance footwear that fits like a glove.

The ‘Grinder’ series, which includes the popular T22 model, is defined by durable, tough footwear capable of holding up to the rigors of extreme lateral stops and starts.

‘Traditionalist’ models are built for players seeing classic looking models with an emphasis on comfort and fit. Prince’s classic Quiktrac & NFS models can be found here.

Players can ‘Meet the New Speed’ online at princetennis.com.

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