Chinese players change the rubber when are smashing why?

because chinese rubbers are not good for smashing , they switch to the backhand side which has european rubber

does malone do that now that he has h3 in bh?

malone is alone kukamonga , god knows what he does , btw I use H8 and I don't need to switch because the sponge is soft enough to smash with

kukamonga said:

does malone do that now that he has h3 in bh?

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I can't find any recent footage of Ma long smashing, we will have to see

Table tennis epic said:

Why Chinese players change from forehand to backhand ruber when thei are Smashing?

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www.youtube.com/watch?v=WD44f16K294

Here's a vid with a few examples. They flip to smash with their European Tenergy (mostly) rubber instead of their Chinese tacky rubbers. Someone mentioned that the European rubber is easier to smash with - but can anyone go into more detail as to why? Is it simply because they are faster, or is it because they are less responsive to spin than a tacky rubber might be?

spin responsiveness , all CNT players boost, I don't think their forehand sides are any less faster or less powerful than their backhand sides

D_Nizzle said:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=WD44f16K294

Here's a vid with a few examples. They flip to smash with their European Tenergy (mostly) rubber instead of their Chinese tacky rubbers. Someone mentioned that the European rubber is easier to smash with - but can anyone go into more detail as to why? Is it simply because they are faster, or is it because they are less responsive to spin than a tacky rubber might be?

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Tacky rubber holds on to the ball longer than non-tacky rubber so it slows the ball down on flat hits, and a little less so on loop drives. If you see top CNT smashing with their Chinese rubber side, they don't smash so much as they topspin smash. If anyone wants a modern example, they can look at Ma Long vs Marcos Freitas or Xu Xin Vs Mizutani or Yoshimura.

NextLevel said:

Tacky rubber holds on to the ball longer than non-tacky rubber so it slows the ball down on flat hits, and a little less so on loop drives. If you see top CNT smashing with their Chinese rubber side, they don't smash so much as they topspin smash. If anyone wants a modern example, they can look at Ma Long vs Marcos Freitas or Xu Xin Vs Mizutani or Yoshimura.

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but ma long uses h3 on both sides.

kukamonga said:

but ma long uses h3 on both sides.

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Yes, but the hardness is different.
Forehand sponge is harder than bh h3, so comparatively, its easier to smash with the softer h3

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I don't now if Ma Long still changes the side, but back in the days, both Ma Long and ZJK use T64 which is a very fast rubber, I used to do that my self and I remember noticing the difference immediately when I smash with T80FX 1.9 on my forehand and when I do that with T64 max

kukamonga said:

but ma long uses h3 on both sides.

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I referred you to a video. Maybe you could watch it and see if he changed sides and then ask the question.

From what I understand, there's a few main reasons.

The tackiness of the forehand sheet takes away from the speed, so you don't want that. Tenergy on the backhand is a lot better for flat hitting like that, so it's preferred.

Apart from having different topsheets on FH and BH, there's also the whole thing where the black rubber, due to the compound, is slightly spinnier and slower, while the red rubber which requires a different compound to get the correct color is usually faster and less responsive to spin.

I'm not sure exactly how correct the above is, but the placebo effect is there, for sure.

Okay, I am wondering if I should ignore the red/black rubber die silliness. Production techniques these days are good enough that stories about red and black versions of the same rubber, which perpetuate the myth that the two colors play differently, are primarily that: MYTH.

The tacky topsheet is part of it. But also the sponge.

The softer sponge is much easier to smash with. That is why Ma Long still switches even though his BH rubber is an H3 topsheet with a different and softer sponge. And the sponge on a rubber like Tenergy is very springy. And that sponge really works much better for smashing than the FH rubber those guys are using.


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@Carl.

2 of my Hong Kong club mates swear that black is better than red for Chinese rubbers. It does not matter what colour for euro/jap rubbers as the quality is top notch but they say that the stereotype of "made in China" is very much alive in DHS rubbers. Black being the natural colour is why it plays much better than red which has its characteristics altered by the intense colouring pigment. Personally, I can't really tell much difference between the 2 but I only used H3neo for a few months whereas they used H3/neo for years. Plus i only tested the difference in colour for a few hours. They are also better than me in terms of skill so I think i will take their word on the red/black issue. They are after all my club's resident Chinese rubber expert.

Wang Liqin doesn't twiddle his bat. But then I think he is the exception that proves the rule

Probably because he used a topspin smash even on the highest of lobs , the guy is a monster , I bet he can hit smashes with a piece of sponge !!

Herbert said:

Wang Liqin doesn't twiddle his bat. But then I think he is the exception that proves the rule

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SilentRain said:

@Carl.

2 of my Hong Kong club mates swear that black is better than red for Chinese rubbers. It does not matter what colour for euro/jap rubbers as the quality is top notch but they say that the stereotype of "made in China" is very much alive in DHS rubbers. Black being the natural colour is why it plays much better than red which has its characteristics altered by the intense colouring pigment. Personally, I can't really tell much difference between the 2 but I only used H3neo for a few months whereas they used H3/neo for years. Plus i only tested the difference in colour for a few hours. They are also better than me in terms of skill so I think i will take their word on the red/black issue. They are after all my club's resident Chinese rubber expert.

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Those guys have pretty darn good mojo on their placebo effect. You compared red and black. You couldn't tell the difference and yet you think the black is better anyway. That's some powerful mojo going on.

The natural color of rubber is not black. The red and the black both get dyed.

If you ever saw rubber cement, that almost clear, cloudy liquid color, I think that is a lot closer to the color of un-dyed rubber.

But technology is good enough that any company, including DHS, can make special dyes that affect the rubber compound in exactly the same way.

If you bought 2 sheets of H3 and one was sitting on the shelf at the store for 3 months and the other was sitting on the shelf for 4 years, they would feel different.

The myth that H3 red is not as good as black is one that MANY people believe. But it is not really true. However, DHS makes and sells so many fewer Red rubbers that when you buy a red one it is likely much older and has likely been sitting on the shelf much longer.

So, yeah, a 4 year old rubber is not as good as a brand new rubber.

There was a time when Ma Lin used red H3 for FH. In Provincial teams, there are guys who do that too. Ma Long's BH rubber has an H3 topsheet. I am comfortable saying the BH topsheet is not worse than the FH topsheet.

But myths and placebo effects are hard to dispel.

You can believe what you want. But the difference is not from the color of the dye.

I think it's also because of the blue sponge.
The H3 isn't made in red with a blue sponge. Only the black one's made with that legendary sponge.
I've been told that the orange sponge is softer than the blue one, so that could be a reason for a black forehand rubber too.