Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

[blahness]

The other thing I experimented with is the modern FH against topspin with less body rotation and more focused on speed and positioning and precision (think short stroke FH counterloops by Felix Lebrun, Harimoto and Lin Shidong, compared to say a full stroke FH counterloop like for eg Ma Long or these days Chen Yuanyu which imo is way too difficult). I find it a lot easier to implement, more consistent and physically much easier.

So basically the idea is to only reserve full power rotation for slower incoming balls, and try to overcome the opponent via speed and continuity first.

 

[Gozo Zyreruna]

• Just came back from my lil'tourney today.
• Format: Team event league format. Team of 3 players. Each game consist of 3 singles + 1 doubles.
• Method of play: Best of three
• Total I played five games; 3 singles + 2 doubles.
• My result is 2W3L.
• My team is still at the bottom of the ranking list.
• Won a singles against the bottom most player. No surprise here and nothing to talk further.
• However there is an upset in the doubles' game.
• Gozo ( Tier C ) was paired with a Tier A partner and we won a Tier A pair opponent.
• My partner was the star as he was the one creating the opportunity for me to end the point. He isn't the attacking type but he is good in crafting opportunity for me, and I converted his effort to points.
• My Tier A opponent pair are playing as though they are in singles' game = failure.
• One needs to play the motherly role, that is nurturing the ball. Another plays the father role; bring home the bacon.
• If both play the motherly role or both fatherly role, it will become a disaster, even though if both are Tier A player in singles.
• Gozo sleeps happy tonight knowing he took down a higher seeded pair tonight.
• Good night to all.

p/s Was using Tibhar Aurus on my FH on my Darker Speed 90.

Forget to mention:

I lost in singles to:

1. Player A: CPen twiddler with Grass DTec + T05 ( Ni Xialian ) style

2. Player B: Shakehand with D64 + Yasaka Antispin on BH

3. The double pair that I lost consist of Player A with the current MS Seed No. 1 pairing.

P/s: Not sure why but I am a pips magnet.

 

[Der_Echte]

Take a 6 month stay in Korea @Gozo Aruna and you will have 30 yrs experience vs pips... and 95% of the pips players wear lipstick and miniskirt/skorts... right around ur age too.

 

[dingyibvs]

As a promotion, the Alameda club's new owners are having a couple of free play days. I went to the one today, and a TON of people showed up, all these Asian grandpas and grandmas. More coaches showed up as well. Most players are pretty low level, so the one of the coaches went to play some players. I played against one of the coaches, got a couple pointers and played a match. Oh man was I destroyed hard. He was taking it easy on me by never attacking hard and mostly defending and I was still just annihilated. Still need a lot of practice for sure, need to increase quality and consistency on both wings by a ton! And of course, really need to get better at service receives.

 

[disaster3]

Hi Guys,
Sometimes ago I mentioned to post some footages of my gameplay, not only training. Maybe these are not from the Ligue plays, but also not a training. First vid is 3:1 (won), 2nd vid 4:0 (won), I'm in green T-shirt.
Golden Vis + D05 (red) BH + T05 (black) FH. I was after 2 weeks of break due to sick leave, so was a bit uptight
This what I'm aware of is when I receive ball in the middle, I don't take my right leg back before FH topspin which resulted incorrect stroke, more comments and useful tips welcome!

First vid:

2nd vid:

 

[Der_Echte]

Hi @disaster3 ,

I see you like to open with ur BH.. a LOT !!! I like that too.

Three things to point out on your BH opening shots that missed.

- You seem to try to rotate the forearm 180 degrees twist... you do not need that much, maybe 1/2 of that, like 90 degrees. All that turning of the forearm make timing to impact 5x more difficult... and doesn't help with power any.

- Sometimes you did not quite get into a good position to set the strike zone... and went for a big BH spin... which is low percentage (going for big energy (speed or spin) when out of position)

- You sometimes strike the ball too far in front of you... this takes away your leverage, timing, bat angle control, and loses power/spin

Imagine bending your left arm 45 degrees and holding it in front of you... move fist in front of left breast. This is the middle of the strike zone, it should not be for me any more than 30 cm.. you are a tall guy maybe 40 cm for you.

You love the sport and keep at it dude.

 

[Der_Echte]

As a promotion, the Alameda club's new owners are having a couple of free play days. I went to the one today, and a TON of people showed up, all these Asian grandpas and grandmas. More coaches showed up as well. Most players are pretty low level, so the one of the coaches went to play some players. I played against one of the coaches, got a couple pointers and played a match. Oh man was I destroyed hard. He was taking it easy on me by never attacking hard and mostly defending and I was still just annihilated. Still need a lot of practice for sure, need to increase quality and consistency on both wings by a ton! And of course, really need to get better at service receives.

Hi @dingyibvs I still need to take my trouble making friends with me to east bay... A 2000 level player named Johnny would die for this action, but he hate the 3 hr drive and traffic from Sacramento. He runs some businesses in SF area, so he is around bay area enough, I should get him linked up with you.

We ought to run the doubles hustle at Pleasanton again, with all the improvement you have reported on BH that should transfer to doubles serve receive and rally when you on FH side of table, I should need only breath oxygen to contribute to team win.

 

[disaster3]

thanks @Der_Echte
Yes BH is my stronger side, and my friend (this one from vid), whenever we play together he also recalls during the gameplay, "Ohh, I've forgotten that you are from the short exception ones, you should not receive balls on BH but on FH"
And with BH I'm working with shorten the stroke, because I'm playing old school BH shot using the wider swing and when I see how juniors/pro play now the modern, short BH shot, I would like to learn it too. As you mentioned, my style is powerful (but this big swing doesn't always translate into such power) and in 90% situation it is mostly finishing stroke. Ball never returns. But in those 10% situation when it returns, I'm not in position, because of this strong shot, when I hit hard, ball returns faster and I'm not in position to repeat.

From my observation I'm aware of, it is as follows:
1. BH topspin, is more powerful and mostly finishing wining the point, but when ball returns I'm out of the position because of wide stroke due to that there is the problem with the consistency, to do some 4-7 repeats...
2. FH topspin, is less powerful vs BH topspin, but the consistency is higher can do 10 and more repeats before failed. Problem is in involving more body and core strength to stroke. Hit is from arm swing rather then from body, hip twist. Probably footwork issue

And maybe due to camera angel, I'm not tall , 1,67m (5'5) (green T-shirt, my friend is rather tall 1.85m - 6'1 blue T-shirt)

Yeah I love TT and even I'm 46 yo, I always do my best and give everything, coming back from training exhausted

 

[latej]

And maybe due to camera angel, I'm not tall , 1,67m (5'5) (green T-shirt, my friend is rather tall 1.85m - 6'1 blue T-shirt)

What? That is the biggest illusion in this century...

 

[latej]

After a match, I kind of feel relaxed. It somehow makes me remember the fight club - volume turned down. Also during the training, I enjoy it and I'm relaxed. But during a match, I'm not yet capable of being relaxed the same way... How do you solve this guys?

 

[Zezima]

After a match, I kind of feel relaxed. It somehow makes me remember the fight club - volume turned down. Also during the training, I enjoy it and I'm relaxed. But during a match, I'm not yet capable of being relaxed the same way... How do you solve this guys?

I try to loop relaxed in the warmup before a match. I try to get a comfortable speed spin and try to get it going for as long as possible. In the match in the first few points especially I try to loop while the stroke and feel is in the memory. Then you get the confidence and don´t think about it as much. Right now I have the problem that I am too relaxed x)

 

[Amaken23]

So....went for a bit of training session in my club (I was only person in the group over 15 years old so me being 32.....felt a bit old xD ). Did few basic elements (Forehand + Backhand topspin, serve, recieve -> attack 3rd ball, practising countering topspins). Then came the games....Dang those boys are quick...and learn so fast. Few months ago I was beating them 3-0 easy and now....when we were playing against one another, each set was battle for survival. I played 6 games in total against 3 of them...won 4 and lost 2, both losses 2-3. My backhand counters worked really well in those matches. I was suprised that I actually was able to put them back on the court many times after they swung forehand quite fast. Not even a big wrist movement, small one...but it worked. I am also little proud of myself since in last game in 5th set, I was losing 3-10 and managed to claw my way back to 10-10 . Sadly, I lost 12-14 afterwards but I was happy about that. Will go tommorow and probably will play more games again so...hopefully this time it'll go better.
I will also test a used sheet of Hurricane 3 blue sponge rubber on my Stiga Azalea Offensive spare blade. First time ever using DHS H3 Neo so....can't wait

 

[Der_Echte]

thanks @Der_Echte
Yes BH is my stronger side, and my friend (this one from vid), whenever we play together he also recalls during the gameplay, "Ohh, I've forgotten that you are from the short exception ones, you should not receive balls on BH but on FH"
And with BH I'm working with shorten the stroke, because I'm playing old school BH shot using the wider swing and when I see how juniors/pro play now the modern, short BH shot, I would like to learn it too. As you mentioned, my style is powerful (but this big swing doesn't always translate into such power) and in 90% situation it is mostly finishing stroke. Ball never returns. But in those 10% situation when it returns, I'm not in position, because of this strong shot, when I hit hard, ball returns faster and I'm not in position to repeat.

From my observation I'm aware of, it is as follows:
1. BH topspin, is more powerful and mostly finishing wining the point, but when ball returns I'm out of the position because of wide stroke due to that there is the problem with the consistency, to do some 4-7 repeats...
2. FH topspin, is less powerful vs BH topspin, but the consistency is higher can do 10 and more repeats before failed. Problem is in involving more body and core strength to stroke. Hit is from arm swing rather then from body, hip twist. Probably footwork issue

And maybe due to camera angel, I'm not tall , 1,67m (5'5) (green T-shirt, my friend is rather tall 1.85m - 6'1 blue T-shirt)

Yeah I love TT and even I'm 46 yo, I always do my best and give everything, coming back from training exhausted

I had both of you mixed up, the comments apply to your friend though.

You in green shirt looked a LOT more stable in BH than blue shirt dude, will look at vid again and comment.

 

[Der_Echte]

Hi @disaster3

Immediately I can say two things on serve receive.

When you are NOT attacking the serve... maybe you are realizing it way too late... you do not step in and touch the ball near the bounce. this is important for many reasons.

- It is 100x more difficult to touch short if you do not touch it near bounce
- It is 10x more difficult to do a quality deep fast underspin spinny push shot if you do not take the ball on the rise 1/2 to top of net

When you wanted to attack the serve with backhand (serve was coming past endline) you used WAY to big a swing.

It is much more efficient to put bat near man zone... and as ball is coming down to bounce on your side, you lower hips 10-20 cm... you should already be bowed forward at waist some... as ball comes up and is getting near strike zone, explode up with legs and when bat is a little below ball use lower arm/some wrist to go forward... go through the ball with compact stroke.

Doing this makes your stroke compact and efficient.

You can borrow this abbreviated stroke on your regular BH with a little more longer lower arm.

Do LESS motion on BH swing on attack vs long ball and you will get MORE from your shot.

Your blue shirt friend did not return your serves a lot, so hard to see many BH opening chances for you.

 

[dingyibvs]

My FH training is finally complete. I can now consistently execute my new form with great power, consistency, and with movement from anywhere around the table. 2 weeks ago I addressed the final issue in my form, as I was forcing a certain racket angle as part of the "overcorrection" training, basically using a form that was the exact opposite of my previous hooking FH. This past week I struggled with consistency, which I suspect was a timing issue.

Remember the coach I played against this weekend? While we were warming up I was having my consistency issues so I asked him about it. I suspected that it was a timing issue, and I thought I needed to perhaps hit the ball a bit later. He's Japanese and doesn't speak much English, so when I asked him if I needed to hit the ball later, he just replied with one word: "earlier". And that was it. I started hitting the ball a bit earlier, and absolutely EVERYTHING just clicked! Ain't it nice having a coach? Since then, I practiced against the robot last night and against my training partner today, and my gosh my FH was beastly. I was crushing every ball, fast or slow, high or low, to my right or my middle, from close to the table or far, and hitting them to where I want them to go. I think I might take some real lessons, see if I can fix some other issues.

On the BH side, I'm still doing some fine tuning. I need to improve my timing during rallies. I have pretty good timing during warmups, but in rallies I'm standing a bit farther away from the table and the timing is often off. I'm also working on incorporating the body more. I'm finally starting to learn how to do it properly and boy does it do wonders. I tried incorporating it into my BH counters, and even when I'm trying my hardest to hold back on power it was still generating incredible shots. It's actually puzzling to me just how friggin powerful the shots are. There's a lot to unravel there, it's like entering a whole new universe of BH game. I tried it later on against his heavy brush opening loops and I was actually able to crush a bunch of them LSD style! It was wild lol.

 

[Tyce]

My FH has been gradually getting better and falling into place over the past few months and over the course of the process I have been gravitating towards faster and more solid gear.
One, because as I'm gaining confidence I feel less need to use flexible, allwood "easy spin" gear.
Two, because I'm learning to make my strokes smaller and more relaxed, so having the bat do more work for me is taking strain off the arm.

Last night I revisited the Yinhe Pro 05, which I set aside before for not being fit for my game. This time it was great. I finally understand the combination of innerfiber and H3.

Next step is to find a good match on BH. So far I've been a lot less fussed with it, but I feel like it's time to find something that helps me get my BH dangerous yet confident.

 

[dingyibvs]

Had to deal with vertigo last weekend, so didn't play that much. Had some light practices with the robot after the worst was over, then back to regular practices by midweek. The FH motion is feeling more natural, though I still fall back to old habits at times. Need to continue to pay attention to it to make sure to execute it correctly each and every single time.

BH timing is getting much better, also finding the appropriate situations for body usage better. Footwork is really critical here, working on it for both FH and BH. With the new robot I have some new drills that stress in and out footwork for opening loops, for example.

On the equipment front, I still think I'm gonna be moving back to the 968, probably the Q968. The 968 FH is just so amazing, and with the Q the BH is pretty solid too so I'm not gonna be missing much there. I'll probably miss the terrific balance of my FZD, but I like the handle/shoulder of the Q a lot better so that's probably gonna be a wash.

 

[AutomaticBackhand]

Had to deal with vertigo last weekend, so didn't play that much. Had some light practices with the robot after the worst was over, then back to regular practices by midweek. The FH motion is feeling more natural, though I still fall back to old habits at times. Need to continue to pay attention to it to make sure to execute it correctly each and every single time.

BH timing is getting much better, also finding the appropriate situations for body usage better. Footwork is really critical here, working on it for both FH and BH. With the new robot I have some new drills that stress in and out footwork for opening loops, for example.

On the equipment front, I still think I'm gonna be moving back to the 968, probably the Q968. The 968 FH is just so amazing, and with the Q the BH is pretty solid too so I'm not gonna be missing much there. I'll probably miss the terrific balance of my FZD, but I like the handle/shoulder of the Q a lot better so that's probably gonna be a wash.

Whenever you post something here, you're bringing up new/old arguments for switching your blade 😂.

For your next purchase, try the Harimoto Super ALC.
My current blade, with a good balance between FH, BH, power and control.

 

[dingyibvs]

Whenever you post something here, you're bringing up new/old arguments for switching your blade 😂.

For your next purchase, try the Harimoto Super ALC.
My current blade, with a good balance between FH, BH, power and control.

The 968 is like that girl you just can't forget. No matter how many times you leave her, you always come crawling back I just played at the club earlier, played a few singles and a few doubles. My last set of doubles I switched to the Q968, my goodness the FH is glorious lol. I like that WCQ style full commit FH drive, and it's just so, so much harder to execute with the FZD. With the Q968 though it feels like I can't miss! Except when I completely whiff, of course, which to be fair WCQ does that a lot too The BH is nice too, definitely not as fast as the FZD, but with the H3 it's got loads of spin, and unlike the W968 the dwell isn't so high that it starts affecting accuracy with the shorter BH stroke.

On the technique side, it's funny how once you fix some issues you start noticing others. Those other issue were always there, but I guess they were always overshadowed by the previous issues. For me, the issue I'm noticing is my step around FH loop, particularly the opening loop, when I get jammed to my body. I didn't pay much attention to it before due to my weak BH loop, but now that it's improved a ton this FH loop is sticking out like a sore thumb. So what happens is that since I don't have time to do a full step around, I do a quick kick with my right leg and turn my body for the loop. But when I kick with my right leg my body stands up, so I'm looping the ball standing straight rather than in a crouched position like with all my other loops. I need to make sure to get to the appropriate height for that shot.

Another kind of odd (but maybe not?) observation is how even though I'm capable of recognizing the spin and loop with the appropriate stroke on the FH side, I seem to have a lot more trouble doing the same on the BH side. The same exact services to my BH would trouble me much more than on the FH side, even though I can read the spin just the same. I would miss because I would apply the wrong racket angle, like aiming too high when it's a topspin serve, or too low when it's a backspin serve. It's interesting how I can't seem to connect the right loop angle with the spin I'm reading due to my lack of experience playing the BH attack. Looks like it's not just about being able to read the spin and to do the stroke, but connecting between the two takes practice too.

Overall I played pretty well, won all singles and doubles matches. The first singles was against a guy I split 2 matches with previously, both 3-2's. He's improved a good bit, going toe-to-toe with some of the best players at the club later in the night, but I've improved more and managed to beat him 3-1 this time. I then played against my doubles partner last tournament, we used to be fairly close with me having an edge, but we played 7 sets total this time and I won all 7. By the end of my singles I was finally starting to connect between the spin I read and the stroke I do on the BH side, and I was just killing it against anything that comes long. I think I'm gonna try to play some more matches this coming week, and try to get my match play caught up to my practice gains a bit more.

 

[latej]

On the technique side, it's funny how once you fix some issues you start noticing others. Those other issue were always there, but I guess they were always overshadowed by the previous issues. For me, the issue I'm noticing is my step around FH loop, particularly the opening loop, when I get jammed to my body. I didn't pay much attention to it before due to my weak BH loop, but now that it's improved a ton this FH loop is sticking out like a sore thumb. So what happens is that since I don't have time to do a full step around, I do a quick kick with my right leg and turn my body for the loop. But when I kick with my right leg my body stands up, so I'm looping the ball standing straight rather than in a crouched position like with all my other loops. I need to make sure to get to the appropriate height for that shot.

I noticed that too, I'm trying to explicitly focus on getting my left leg further away during stepping-around, so that I stand wider - and am able to be moving to the left even during looping (because there is space when standing wide).

Another kind of odd (but maybe not?) observation is how even though I'm capable of recognizing the spin and loop with the appropriate stroke on the FH side, I seem to have a lot more trouble doing the same on the BH side. The same exact services to my BH would trouble me much more than on the FH side, even though I can read the spin just the same. I would miss because I would apply the wrong racket angle, like aiming too high when it's a topspin serve, or too low when it's a backspin serve. It's interesting how I can't seem to connect the right loop angle with the spin I'm reading due to my lack of experience playing the BH attack. Looks like it's not just about being able to read the spin and to do the stroke, but connecting between the two takes practice too.

Funny, happens to me too. Serves that I'd just loop on the FH I have more trouble on the BH. I need to work on it off-season. On the other hand serves which I handle better with BH sometimes I have trouble on the FH - those shorter serves - I need to improve there too - both the FH receive and the BH flick from the FH-side, now required...