Neuromuscular compatibility in tabletennis !

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hello everyone ,
I have a problem in my technique.. when i do a training session sometimes i feel i can't separate the upper body from the lower.. i mean when i do topspin drills with footwork my arm can't do the strokes with relax position when i move my legs hardly .. so this make my strokes hard, and my friend also said: you don't touch the ball with relaxation, so, how can i improve that??, anyone has exercises for improve the Neuromuscular compatibility ??, is getting it difficult when you override the young age(i'm 19 years old), i hope this thread be useful and i hope you can help me.
 

Brs

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One thing you can try is slowing down the exercise until it is so easy that you can do it and still be relaxed. That may be so slow you feel stupid, like it is ridiculous. But if you only increase the speed a little at a time so that you can still be relaxed, after a while you may work up to a normal speed without getting tense.
 
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The issue you are talking about is different than your title suggests. This doesn’t have much to do with compatibility or much about neuromuscular patterning or repatterning.

This has to do with the fact that your upper body is doing one thing and your lower body is doing something different.

So this is about learning the specific independent coordination for the task at hand.

And there is a very easy way to train this.

Slowing things down with the ball may help. But, probably not. Because when you go slow enough, the coordination becomes different.

But shadow strokes, and adding footwork to shadow strokes, can give you the coordination of the movements, without the ball.

Then when you reintroduce the ball, after learning the independent coordination of lower body and upper body, in stroke-reset-move-stroke-reset-move, you start being able to learn the patterns with the ball.

In this first video, I am doing a 2 point drill with a one step. First I am doing just the FH and going from one point to be next and back. Then I am going FH to BH and back while doing a one step back and forth between two spots.

https://youtu.be/JMUgZJWxQfI

The next video has a bunch of footwork drills from
Killerspin with Primorac demonstrating them. Learning shadow versions of each of these, without the ball there would be the next step.

https://youtu.be/nD04UQiZsyw

After you can do shadow versions of all of those, you could start improvising.

Getting the coordination to do these drills in shadow version will make it so that you can learn, footwork, stroke combinations during training with the ball much much much easier to learn. You will still need to learn them with the ball. But they will cut down how long it takes to be proficient at them in training with the ball.

When you try to learn those drills while using the ball, you are trying to learn the coordination of upper and lower body at the same time as learning to track and contact the ball.

When you do the shadow drills first, you are teaching the independent coordination of upper and lower body first. And then you add the element of adjusting to the ball when you have the body coordination under control.

So, understand. You are not alone. Most people who learn this later than 12 years old, need to isolate skills first to help the process be less painful.


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says Do you change your rubber in your same blade (infinity...
says Do you change your rubber in your same blade (infinity...
Member
Jun 2016
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Read 6 reviews
The issue you are talking about is different than your title suggests. This doesn’t have much to do with compatibility or much about neuromuscular patterning or repatterning.

This has to do with the fact that your upper body is doing one thing and your lower body is doing something different.

So this is about learning the specific independent coordination for the task at hand.

And there is a very easy way to train this.

Slowing things down with the ball may help. But, probably not. Because when you go slow enough, the coordination becomes different.

But shadow strokes, and adding footwork to shadow strokes, can give you the coordination of the movements, without the ball.

Then when you reintroduce the ball, after learning the independent coordination of lower body and upper body, in stroke-reset-move-stroke-reset-move, you start being able to learn the patterns with the ball.

In this first video, I am doing a 2 point drill with a one step. First I am doing just the FH and going from one point to be next and back. Then I am going FH to BH and back while doing a one step back and forth between two spots.

https://youtu.be/JMUgZJWxQfI

The next video has a bunch of footwork drills from
Killerspin with Primorac demonstrating them. Learning shadow versions of each of these, without the ball there would be the next step.

https://youtu.be/nD04UQiZsyw

After you can do shadow versions of all of those, you could start improvising.

Getting the coordination to do these drills in shadow version will make it so that you can learn, footwork, stroke combinations during training with the ball much much much easier to learn. You will still need to learn them with the ball. But they will cut down how long it takes to be proficient at them in training with the ball.

When you try to learn those drills while using the ball, you are trying to learn the coordination of upper and lower body at the same time as learning to track and contact the ball.

When you do the shadow drills first, you are teaching the independent coordination of upper and lower body first. And then you add the element of adjusting to the ball when you have the body coordination under control.

So, understand. You are not alone. Most people who learn this later than 12 years old, need to isolate skills first to help the process be less painful.


Sent from The Subterranean Workshop by Telepathy
thank you for your feedback carl, you are stunning as always.
 
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BTW: I think this is a funny story.

There was a period of about a year where one of the places I teach had me teach a class with this thing called a smart bell:

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One of the exercises I had the class do was a little bit like a shadow stroke with FH and one step, like my first video. But everyone was holding one hand on each handle.

At some point I decided to have them actually do the one step FH two point drill to make it a little harder.

With a hand on each handle, the people in the class were okay. Making it one hand on the weight so the other hand didn’t help the rotation, NOBODY in the class could get the coordination. Even though, in my head, they seemed so similar.

That coordination is complicated until you get your body to coordinate the upper and lower body as they move independently.

It is kind of like what happens for a drummer as their right foot plays a line for the base drum. The left foot keeps time on the high hat. And the hands are playing rhythms independent of each other and independent of the feet. The lines are timed with each other. But they are independent of each other.

In TT the lower body and upper body’s actions are timed with each other but independent of each other.


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just do shadow drills with the right technique over and over again. some people instantly get it, some people take a lot of time and some after practicing a long time all of sudden gets the technique.
 
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Great topic. I have a question regarding this. I was just wondering if anyone thinks about there torsos hips especially front shoulder as the catalyst to start the legs?
This is something that I have struggle with at times (upper body movements with legs etc). I have changed a few things and improved a tone here, totally agree with shadow drills ( I do them fairly regularly) and im able to train it’s much less of a problem, but when I get busy and can’t training in or slack off with shadow at home It seems to show up from time to time, and I seem to I notice it not only more noticeable when looping back spin balls. I have been well aware of the discussion about the legs being the catalyst for good swing mechanics but there was always been something about being low over my front leg, focusing on power from my legs, dropping the shoulder , and maybe timing that just made this feel harder for me to synchronize. But I found when I focus more on turning my torsos, then clearing the hips, followed by the front shoulder it seems to, I don’t know be a catalyst to Naturally lead towards getting the most out of my legs. I Have not really heard this from anyone one per say, So I just thought I would ask and see if anyone else thinks about the torso as a jumpstart or catalyst towards lower body and full body engagement?
Also I’m pretty tall over 6,5 with long arms, maybe more to synchronize?
Thanks


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says Spin and more spin.
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I was just wondering if anyone thinks about there torsos hips especially front shoulder as the catalyst to start the legs?

Nice post. Good question.

The way movement works and the way imaging a movement, can help YOU improve the way you perform that movement may not always be how the movement is actually performed.

What am I actually saying? Your feet being on the ground are actually the only part of you that is grounded.

What does this mean?

-You can think of initiating the movement from your center of gravity: from center out.

-You can think of initiating the movement from the periphery towards the core.

If either of those do help, and get you to time the legs, hips, torso arm circuit, then that is great. Use it.

But if your feet are on the ground, they are what has the ultimate leverage to move you. Because everything else is open chain and your feet have leverage to use the ground which is technically referred to as closed chain.

So, even if you image the movement from the dip in the shoulder, how the feet press into the ground to leverage the movement is where the movement actually will be initiated when the mechanics are optimal.

I think I will make a second post giving more illustration of what I am talking about.


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So, I think I am going to use a few examples from boxing because, perhaps you will see what I am talking about.

Perhaps I am dating myself. I am going to talk about three guys mainly. Muhammed Ali, George Forman and Mike Tyson.

Ali spent a lot of his time on his toes. A lot of his time moving backwards, dancing, being elusive. He did not use his legs or the ground to give him too much help with punching power. But when he went for a bigger punch, then he used his legs and the ground. Those arm punches could be initiated from somewhere other than the ground. But that is also why he didn’t have much power.

https://youtu.be/jkhpZoPOfZI

If you watch, the punches where Ali is moving backwards or sideways, they are mainly from his arms. His legs don’t help; what they are doing is separate from the upper body action. However, when he grounds his feet, bends his knees and digs in to move forward with the punch, he is clearly initiating from the ground up.

Now, Forman is interesting to study. When he is older and overweight his punching mechanics are actually better because he is so much less mobile and this actually forces him to use the ground.

When he was younger so many of his punches were arm punches, off the wrong foot, with his legs backward, or worse....crossed. But the guy was so strong that he still had the ground behind him and KRAZY power: almost like a Der_Echte Rambo Loop. [emoji2] hahahaha

And every so often, his feet and body mechanics synced up. Usually, when that happened, if the punch connected, the fight was over.

https://youtu.be/WL7KnkWWXbQ

Now Forman was pretty big and amazingly strong. I can only imagine what would have happened if he had the kind of punch mechanics that a young Mike Tyson had.

Here is Mike Tyson.

https://youtu.be/dRlRO3D4kcw

If you watch his legs, his stance, how low he gets sometimes, you can see him move the floor of the ring under him to initiate a lot of those punches. He has amazing punch mechanics from all angles. And he was a little guy consistently fighting against fighters who were taller, had a longer reach and weighed more.

Anyway.....particularly a loop vs backspin....it should be more like a TT version of what Tyson is doing with the legs initiating the movement.

But my money says, Tyson wasn’t imaging the movement that way. And if the image of dipping the shoulder to initiate the movement helps you get the kinetic chain that starts from the feet into the ground, then go with that. Over time, as your body gets the whole kinetic chain into muscle memory, your image may develop.

But it sounds like where you are starting from, that is a good image for you to help you kickstart the synchronization of feet, legs, hips, core rotation, weight transfer, torso, shoulder, upper arm, lower arm, wrist! [emoji2] Yikes, that is a long kinetic chain we are messing with! [emoji2]


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If your center of gravity is moved far enough away from where you stand (for instance lean to the left over your left leg), you are going to move so that you keep your balance and don't fall. It's a reflex. This may be what happens when you start to move your upper body.

I dont know if it is textbook, but it's quite fast at the table when you do it on purpose.
 
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Yup, a chain in sequence, how to be loose and magnify each muscle and how to channel the kinetic energy all the way to the end. The essence of power transfer described by USD Card as he redirects the Goonies to another false location thanks to a recent update of Pokemon Go.
 
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Carl thanks for the in-depth response’s, explanation they both make perfect sense/and are helpful! And besides it being awesome to rewatch some of those boxing highlights, I think it actually is a pretty fitting illustration. I don’t know if it’s what I look like, what I’m doing may not look that different I need to tape myself again but from what I feel the Forman’s example of movmet with torso shoulder load seems pretty fitting. Anyway As talbon said probably not text book, I have not heard it discussed that way but this it has really been helpful synchronizing movement.



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If a good part of my day job wasn’t movement analysis, I would have REALLY bad technique. Hahahahaha.

Glad I could use an illustration that helped make the movement make some more sense to you.


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Time. It just takes time and this is common in adult learners. Don't get frustrated. It is like learning a choreography. You are slow and clumsy at first. Later you get more graceful and learn new steps faster. You have to learn the partterns at slow speed and then speed them up. But stick with it and you will learn.
 
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