5A sized in the grip with a gentle taper and an acorn-style bead that puts out great tone from around the drum-kit. A very well balanced, responsive and solid feeling stick. American Hickory dowels have to meet very strict quality characteristics to be made into a Vater drumstick. Vater's Hickory is stress released which is done by slowly raising the temperature at the end of the drying cycle for 8 hours. This relieves the stress in the wood and produces straight sticks that stay straight.