Technique reverting to pre-lesson standard. Why?

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Hi all.
I need some advice
My background to current Is as followe
Age 54. need to work on fitness as maybe 20% overweight, some flexibility issues but nothing to affect my technique?
I've started playing again 5 months ago after at least 40 years when I played a little as a junior.
I have lessons once a week with a well known international coach and play at a club once a week.
I also have a robot / practice facilities / table at home where I practice at least three times a week.
The lessons are going well (had 8 so far since my return to TT) as during the lessons stroke practice is good as is my understanding of what I'm trying to achieve even though I may not manage it a lot of the time
Problem is when I come to playing at the club, my technique seems to go totally out of the window as does my focus. My technique when playing matches seems to revert back to previous poor technique
Is this common?
All input welcome
Thanks
 
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says 2023 Certified Organ Donor
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Andy, sadly, that is what happens a lot.

It takes a lot of repetition to get it to where you do well in practice, then it also takes a lot of match practice to get what you improved on in practice to show. Matches are obviously not like practice, you are under time pressure and you do not know placement of the ball most of the time. This will cause you to go unconsciously back.

That is what happens when you play matches to practice winning.

What you could do to mitigate that is to play matches to practice certain combinations. You will lose a lot more points, but it will help your growth that at a point much later you are much stronger.

Footwork training is over-rated. What do I mean by that? Many players and coaches too will focus on developing complicated footwork that you will likely use but a few points a match. many players are not physically ready to execute a step around FH, a fast crossover step to cover wide FH corner, then another crossover or hop step two step to get teh BH blocked ball.

Effective stance, balance, basic fundamental strokes, and several useful easy to learn footworks (like one step, two step, hop step, slide step, and micro step) are a lot more important. With decent anticipation, effective movement using the easy to learn footworks, and good balance/recovery, one can do a lot at a high level. I see USATT 2100 rated players play that level without any complicated combination footwork abilities, all they do is stay at table and use the easy small footworks to be in position and take ball early.

Don't let this all get you down, I can tell you, the more I learn about TT and actually improve, the more I discover I REALLY needed to learn more and never knew 1/10 of what I should. This is a natural progression and you have to be prepared mentally to take a few steps back in match play before what you learn takes effect in a match. The ones who train frequently often take 6 months for what they have improved to show in match play.
 
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To add to the "Footwork Training is Overrated" in before I get internetz crucified...

Spending too much time on footwork you will never use even 3 levels above your level is a waste of time, when there are a whole host of applicable fundamental things that are easy to grasp and practice... like stance, balance, recovery, basic stroke, reading of spin, easy movement techniques...

It is a lot more profitable to focus on those kind of fundamentals than to go apeshyt right away on complicated stuff that is too high level.

Footwork training is REAL important, you can hit if you are not in position in enough time. I just say too many players and coaches go about it an ineffective way.

There IS a place for training on things above your level you do not use, as training on them when you get to the appropriate level will make it a lot harder to progress from that level. An example would be for an intermediate player to start practicing advanced serves and soft touch short returns of serves. Intermediate level doesn't really require any of that stuff, everyone has so many fundamental flaws that get in the way, BUT by the time a player grows past the intermediate level, they see the ball better and can more easily grow in that area and their level explodes a lot more than the player who waited too long to start training those.

All these points I make are very well accepted as good common sense, yet at the same time, many players and coaches all have their own idea of how to go about stuff that is way different.

It is not my place to say THIS is THE way or THAT is THE way, I just lay down some sensible concepts. There is not just ONE "Right" answer in Table Tennis.
 
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Watch this video
and you will have your answer :)

1) Identify what aspect of your game is blocking you from executing the correct stroke in matches. Is it your mental state?Are you anxious?Is it the different style of rallying?Serving receiving? Footwork? Are your muscles too tense?

2)Train that aspect of your game in match simulation mode.

For example, lets say you are not relaxed enough. Play as many matches as possible in your club, and your target will be to be relaxed in order to execute your strokes correctly, focus on your goal to be relaxed, pay no attention to the score or the out come of your match.

Is it receiving?Again same thing, My way of training receiving is playing matches with my mates, but the difference here is that i focus on landing as many successful recevings as I can and they get to serve all the time. I dont serve a single serve throughout the match

Remember it will take a long time before you can fully adapt, your absence was very long. So be patient and always set goals on your training
 
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If when you play matches, all you are doing is trying to win... you won't grow much, except to practice how to win, and if it is vs a better player, you won't get much practice at that.

You grow more when you use some of your matches to tryout something... OR you simply have fun playing and you end up unconsciously applying what you were training without stress or pressure.
 
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There are several points.... probably just start from match first since many people like to play a match to improve

When play for match, it might be ok play for winning. However, number of people will never go back review why they losing "a" point in each play. When you play a match:

when you win a point, rethink how you win it
1. because opponent make unforce error?
2. because you put a good placement?
3. because your stroke is what you expected?

when you lose a point, rethink why you lose it
1. opponent just hit as what he expected?
2. your return very bad?
3. if your return is bad, then why? the racket angle at initial and final position is not good? stroke not good? or what else
4. Is your mentality issue? Too rush. Too rage. Too frustrated. (This is the most important point of losing, perform all incorrect stroke from what you had learn in practice)

So back to footwork and practice...

Many people can be a good player, but not much people can be good coach. As Der_Echte mentioned, footwork sometime might be over RATED (I capped it). Not everyone can cope with all those fancy/complicated foot work, especially for people who over 50 years old. Some can, some cannot. I have a TT player here, who is partial handicap (one leg unable to move freely), what he do is play close to table. And since he switch to one side long pip and do some proper training, he can beat most of us if we play 2 best out of 3. And many times he still able to win if we played 3 out of 5 game, without and footwork like Joo or whoever needed. Whenever his mind is calm enough, then he could win.

So during regular lesson practice, even though you had a coach, you still need to make your objective clear. For example FH to FH drill. What you want to achieve? Consistence placement? Consistence speed? Consistence power during that session? I had seen and played with many amateur player who during this kind of warmup, practice session, they just "BAM" and hit hard, does not care about the other side. Then for sure, when come to a match, they just wonder why their FH become inconsistence.
 
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What in particular are you talking about? It really is just a matter of forming a new habit. Watching videos definately helps as does mirror practice if it's a certain shot. Just a matter of doing it over, and over, and over. If you look at my videos, it took my a year of hard work and thousands of balls fed to me to change my forehand, and that's just the basic stroke, there's still heaps more to work on. It's a hard slow process and most mature players can't break those habits, like smoking and losing weight, it's hard. You can change though if you want to.
 
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From my own experience, I've found that when playing matches (even just a match during a trading knock-up), I play to win and therefore don't necessarily try shots or technique that I'm weaker at...because I'm prioritising winning the point rather than practicing a stroke or footwork etc. Somewhat ironically, being less focused on winning could make you a better player.
 
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To add to the "Footwork Training is Overrated" in before I get internetz crucified...

Thanks for that.
So bacally it's a case of keep the practise going and eventually the correct practice strokes / technique will become match technique

Der_Echte, he just put your 3,000 words into one sentence.

Watch this video
and you will have your answer :)

This video from TTFrenzy has the best REAL answer possible. So how do you train ugly in TT? Do random drills, do game simulation drills, serve and receive drills. There are hundreds from simple ones that add elements of random in slowly. There are ones that are completely random.

The simplest one would be, you and a training partner taking two serves each and just playing points as if you are trying to win without counting.

Here is a serve and receive drill that progresses from more simple to more complex and more random:

1) a) player one serves short backspin, b) player two pushes long to FH, c) player one opens (loops)off the push, d) open play to win the point.

2) a) player one serves short backspin, b) player two pushes long to BH, c) player one opens, d) open play to win the point.

(When both players can open with a BH loop or a FH loop off the long push to the BH, then it is time to make it harder).

3) a) player one serves short backspin, b) player two pushes long anywhere (random placement changing placement each time), c) player one opens, d) open play to win the point.

4) a) player one serves short backspin, b) player two pushes anywhere, short or long, c) player one opens with a flip or a loop depending on placement, d) open play to win the point.

You can do a similar progression of serve and receive drills for flipping the short balls. Where the serve or the push starts short in a particular area and the flip is done over and over and the drill progresses to where the flip can be from anywhere and it could be a FH flip or a BH flip and then to where the ball could be long or short anywhere so you would have to choose whether to flip or loop.

But, here is a random placement multiball drill:


So, train ugly. :)
 
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By the way, if your strokes are not fundamentally sound, you do have to do block training to get the form and the technique as well. So you need to do block training side by side with random training until the fundamentals are sound enough to focus more and more on random training.

Or, at least in Table Tennis where the technique of the strokes are complicated, that is the case.
 
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You need to understand your own style of play, what are your strong shots and what are your weaknesses. This can have a major impact on the win / loss ratio in matches if you are able to apply your best style in the match or be victim of the opponents style.

Training will probably be working across a range of things to gradually improve on but might not demonstrate how to apply effectively in a match. Sometimes you need to take more control of the training from the coach and say what you want to work on and why. So do you work to develop using your strengths or weaknesses?

For example if you have a very reliable and quick backhand and a relatively poor forehand - do you spend lots of time correcting the forehand or spend time developing ways to use the backhand more. There is no right or wrong but being aware of what you are doing and why can help in preparing for match play.


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Der_Echte, he just put your 3,000 words into one sentence.

Carl (and to all on TTD) by now you know I can get concise and give new meaning to BREVITY when I need to, like when the Philly Mob is about to fire upon you or toss an explosive device Ur way I yell "DUCK!"

Otherwise, like Popeye, I am what I am... and I am a dude who likes to talk, both orally and in writing. There is some fun in this and I suspect Carl is of teh same nature, perhaps secretly more so than I.

I know Carl won't be happy about me letting hiz "Secrets" out of the bag, but they will never find his 24 crack houses and safe houses spread out across NYC and will NEVER crack the code to his secret communications.
 
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Carl (and to all on TTD) by now you know I can get concise and give new meaning to BREVITY when I need to, like when the Philly Mob is about to fire upon you or toss an explosive device Ur way I yell "DUCK!"

Otherwise, like Popeye, I am what I am... and I am a dude who likes to talk, both orally and in writing. There is some fun in this and I suspect Carl is of teh same nature, perhaps secretly more so than I.

I know Carl won't be happy about me letting hiz "Secrets" out of the bag, but they will never find his 24 crack houses and safe houses spread out across NYC and will NEVER crack the code to his secret communications.

Hahaha. I almost wrote in that long post that that quote came from, "see how concise I am?" I just couldn't resist razing you.
 
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I had the same problem when only learning the basics. I was getting a little bit frustrated, so I talked to my coach about it. He told me that this problem will pass after some training sessions. And he was completely right. Another thing that helped me a lot was that my coach was watching me when I was playing a match, so that match also became some kind of training. He kept pointing at all my faults until I started to play matches using the right technique.

My brother also had this problem, and he noticed it very fast. We were just playing a match, and he just stopped and said that matchplay was ruining the results of the trainings. And he didn't play a match until he noticed that he started using the right technique in every situation. So, this worked for him aswell.

I think you just need to keep training, and your problem will disappear.
 
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And just yesterday i came back from the club and i almost lost all games, before yesterday i was there and played some games and won more than losing, so to me i was so disappointed what happened to me in just one day.

I may know my problems, but what i can do if i can't make some solutions that are the key for me to improve or win? I also started this year by February and i lost most of my skills and slowly i am trying to get it back, but in this club, it is like almost all opponents are either having coaching for a while or they are playing since a while too and i feel that they all left me behind even those i defeated sometimes.

Good video and answers here, i hope once i buy a table tennis and can have time to practice or have coaching that i will improve significantly, but others are improving too so can i catch their levels one day? it is like they are stopping and i am moving, who knows, in the past when i had the table i was playing and practicing like everyday for hours.
 
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Ah, don't worry about it. Buy another 10 really expensive rackets. And don't bother spending any time or money on coaching.

Let's see, you already spent $1,500.00-$2,000.00 on blades and rubbers. Imagine if you had only spent $130.00 on one Racket (blade and rubbers, total cost $130.00) that was good enough and had the other $1,870.00 to spend on coaching.

If coaching costs $40.00 per hour where you are, that would be 47 hours of coaching. If it costs $30.00 an hour, it would be 62 hours of coaching.

But why pay for coaching when you can buy a table to go with your 10 rackets? Maybe you should buy 3 to find out which is the best one.


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That makes me really wish we had more people in USA doing just that and buying from our company. :(

But that isn't gunna make our company grow much. Getting more kids into TT and getting them, their friends, and the MOM boss engaged in big numbers is the only way to grow.
 
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