Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

[andymagata]

I can relate to this in a slightly different way. I started playing table tennis as an adult, and after almost two years I’m still very much a beginner. I’ve tried a ridiculous number of blades and rubbers along the way, because I genuinely enjoy the equipment side of the hobby — probably almost as much as playing itself.


But I’ve gradually realized that I don’t really need to become “good” for table tennis to be worthwhile for me. I enjoy figuring things out: why one rubber feels completely different from another, what happens when I change my contact, why a particular blade makes a certain stroke easier, and so on. Sometimes I spend a whole session discovering one tiny thing that actually works for me.


And this exploration period has brought me a lot of fun. But I think I’m actually arriving at a conclusion now: I have found something I enjoy playing with more than ever before. I don’t know if it’s because it aligns better with my current skills, the kind of player I want to become, or simply because it feels more natural to me. Maybe it’s a bit of all three.


I’m still not very good, of course. 😄 But I feel like I’m getting somewhere. And that, in itself, is really enjoyable.


I also believe that, for most people, the exploration period eventually comes to an end — and when it does, you’ve hopefully found a setup that really appeals to you, one that you simply want to play with most of the time.


And to reach that point, I think we just need to be a little bit brave. In my case, I went back to a blade that I had previously ruled out as not fitting my style or feeling. I also started to use short pips - which was nothing I wanted to try - but I did it anyway - and I immediately liked it.

 

[NextLevel]

Lots of activities in life can be pretty fun and addictive at a challenging level even if you aren't fantastic at them. Table tennis, chess, they are mostly games that tap into one of the fundamental human drives tied to goal achievement at various levels.

EJing is definitely a lot of fun and as i like to point out, it is cheaper than buying cars. You can also improve while EJing even if it might not be as quickly as someone who largely used the same equipment. EJing appeals to the human desire for quantity and variety. Such desires are parts of the reasons some people accumulate vast hoards of wealth or harems of partners so again, not a drive to sniff at.

As for improvement, Tyce is quite right, the more you skipped over the key phases of experiencing the right training environment in your youth, you have to find and dedicate similar time as an adult and that is not for everyone and some would argue impractical for people with other financial goals or families to support unless they make TT their primary hobby next to those things. The biggest thing is always coaching though or being exposed to players a bit above the levels you want to aspire to so you can acquire the skills to play like them. That, especially if it comes as a form of mentorship from someone who is genuinely interested in improving your game, tends to be the bulk of it.

 

[Tyce]

I can relate to this in a slightly different way. I started playing table tennis as an adult, and after almost two years I’m still very much a beginner. I’ve tried a ridiculous number of blades and rubbers along the way, because I genuinely enjoy the equipment side of the hobby — probably almost as much as playing itself.

100% agree. I loved discovering different sensations, blades that were wayyyy too fast, doesn't matter because I just really enjoyed the ride!

But I’ve gradually realized that I don’t really need to become “good” for table tennis to be worthwhile for me. I enjoy figuring things out: why one rubber feels completely different from another, what happens when I change my contact, why a particular blade makes a certain stroke easier, and so on. Sometimes I spend a whole session discovering one tiny thing that actually works for me.


And this exploration period has brought me a lot of fun. But I think I’m actually arriving at a conclusion now: I have found something I enjoy playing with more than ever before. I don’t know if it’s because it aligns better with my current skills, the kind of player I want to become, or simply because it feels more natural to me. Maybe it’s a bit of all three.


I’m still not very good, of course. 😄 But I feel like I’m getting somewhere. And that, in itself, is really enjoyable.


I also believe that, for most people, the exploration period eventually comes to an end — and when it does, you’ve hopefully found a setup that really appeals to you, one that you simply want to play with most of the time.


And to reach that point, I think we just need to be a little bit brave. In my case, I went back to a blade that I had previously ruled out as not fitting my style or feeling. I also started to use short pips - which was nothing I wanted to try - but I did it anyway - and I immediately liked it.

I was actually giving up on the Innerforce Layer ALC, but I'm still using right now. What turned it around for me was actually finding the right rubbers to fit my current playing level as well as allowing me some headroom to grow, and they are just working very well on this blade, much better than on the blade I had in mind.
There's still one blade to come, and time will tell if it's a blade I will be playing or just keeping.

Now, this focus on a single setup does also happen to be at the same time I promoted, and I feel the need to stop fiddling around, boss up and get better. Cutting out the equipment distraction is a big, quick win (well it's quick because I actually have something I like to play with, too, ofc) and it's no coincidence that I feel the urge to cut out unnecessary distractions and just focus on playing, tactics, ways to get something up on the opponents because I actually *have* to do that now.

Speaking of which, my one win on Monday means I've equaled my 2009 performance, 3 more wins and I will be equaling 2006, and anything over that will be my peak career performance

 

[JustANoob]

Got my blade today, thank you very much @NextLevel

Will probably post a picture of what I plan to put on it in the EJ thread when the rubbers arrive

 

[barusu]

As for improvement, Tyce is quite right, the more you skipped over the key phases of experiencing the right training environment in your youth, you have to find and dedicate similar time as an adult and that is not for everyone and some would argue impractical for people with other financial goals or families to support unless they make TT their primary hobby next to those things.

Im 27yo, full time worker too 👀
Just started training in a club since mid 2025.. so yes i missed the "after school tt training arc" in my life.

 

[NextLevel]

Im 27yo, full time worker too 👀
Just started training in a club since mid 2025.. so yes i missed the "after school tt training arc" in my life.

I started playing at 34, there is hope. Your game needs structured aggression, IMHO, you relied a little bit too much on touch rather than seeking loose opportunities to hit/drive.

 

[Tyce]

I started playing at 34, there is hope. Your game needs structured aggression, IMHO, you relied a little bit too much on touch rather than seeking loose opportunities to hit/drive.

That sounds like a development phase. Developing touch first is a good idea but at some point one does need to move onto controlled offense in order to progress.

 

[dingyibvs]

So I've been trialing the Rxton 7 37 on my BH this week. I've had 2 sessions this far with it. It basically plays like an easier to use H3 37. Relatively soft, a bit slow, fairly high arc. Much easier to hit into and has much better hand feel than the H3.

In match situations it's the same as well, with the same pros and cons. It's incredible with active blocks, you kinda just block forward over the ball and you can return any loop with great spin to anywhere on the table. Loops are spinny but don't expect to blast past anyone.

I'm in a bit of a dilemma. I think with my FH as well as my current play style this probably would complement my game very well. However, I aspire to be an aggressive looper on both sides, basically powerlooping everything everywhere. For that something like the D09c probably would work better. Do I use something that works for my game, or something that'd work for what I hope my game will be?

 

[just_one_more_chop]

I’ve tried a ridiculous number of blades and rubbers along the way, because I genuinely enjoy the equipment side of the hobby — probably almost as much as playing itself.


But I’ve gradually realized that I don’t really need to become “good” for table tennis to be worthwhile for me. I enjoy figuring things out: why one rubber feels completely different from another, what happens when I change my contact, why a particular blade makes a certain stroke easier, and so on. Sometimes I spend a whole session discovering one tiny thing that actually works for me.


And this exploration period has brought me a lot of fun. But I think I’m actually arriving at a conclusion now: I have found something I enjoy playing with more than ever before. I don’t know if it’s because it aligns better with my current skills, the kind of player I want to become, or simply because it feels more natural to me. Maybe it’s a bit of all three.


I’m still not very good, of course. 😄 But I feel like I’m getting somewhere. And that, in itself, is really enjoyable.

I could not have put my EJ journey in better words than this. My playing level did not really increase or decrease but I would do it all again for the fun and enjoyment I had on the way.

If the recent TTD Meetup has teached me anything, than that there is a (sometimes strange) style for anyone 😅. Trying out quite a lot in the last months, I feel like I narrowed down the path I want to go with my play.

I will get a chance to test myself tomorrow at a club match, opponents are probably rated a lot higher than me, but I will aim to use my forehand with more stability just as @NextLevel kindly took some time to coach me last weekend 🏓

 

[NextLevel]

That sounds like a development phase. Developing touch first is a good idea but at some point one does need to move onto controlled offense in order to progress.

I hear you - I do believe touch and controlled aggression (as opposed to all out aggression) can be developed simultaneously.

 

[Archosaurus]

Played extremely well yesterday, the haircut buff is real. Hitting a bunch of shots which were just impossible with the damn thing in my face. Must be worth at least 50-100 rating points and not joking this time.

Can confirm my exact DHS B2 that I received is some kind of super-blade, because it feels closer to 500AUD+ blades than the meager sum I paid for it. The W81 reverbs quite a lot and is a bit unpredictable compared to the B2, so it's clear which one is gonna be the main blade. I have some minor gripes with it but I couldn't feel them at all when actually using it.

I might order a B2X later just to EJ a bit but also to replace the W81 and then use whichever of those I like more as the main blade. It's probably also good to have something pretty similar as the backup anyway. I don't hate the W81 so I'll probably just keep it until I find someone who needs it more; it's just the quality you expect from the price, while the B2 I got is way beyond that lol.

 

[NextLevel]

 

[NextLevel]

Played extremely well yesterday, the haircut buff is real. Hitting a bunch of shots which were just impossible with the damn thing in my face. Must be worth at least 50-100 rating points and not joking this time.

Can confirm my exact DHS B2 that I received is some kind of super-blade, because it feels closer to 500AUD+ blades than the meager sum I paid for it. The W81 reverbs quite a lot and is a bit unpredictable compared to the B2, so it's clear which one is gonna be the main blade. I have some minor gripes with it but I couldn't feel them at all when actually using it.

I might order a B2X later just to EJ a bit but also to replace the W81 and then use whichever of those I like more as the main blade. It's probably also good to have something pretty similar as the backup anyway. I don't hate the W81 so I'll probably just keep it until I find someone who needs it more; it's just the quality you expect from the price, while the B2 I got is way beyond that lol.

Sounds like you and Tyce had a subliminal telepathic meeting somewhere in the astral plane and returned with the same decision in physical form and with similar results.

 

[kindof99]

I can relate to this in a slightly different way. I started playing table tennis as an adult, and after almost two years I’m still very much a beginner. I’ve tried a ridiculous number of blades and rubbers along the way, because I genuinely enjoy the equipment side of the hobby — probably almost as much as playing itself.


But I’ve gradually realized that I don’t really need to become “good” for table tennis to be worthwhile for me. I enjoy figuring things out: why one rubber feels completely different from another, what happens when I change my contact, why a particular blade makes a certain stroke easier, and so on. Sometimes I spend a whole session discovering one tiny thing that actually works for me.


And this exploration period has brought me a lot of fun. But I think I’m actually arriving at a conclusion now: I have found something I enjoy playing with more than ever before. I don’t know if it’s because it aligns better with my current skills, the kind of player I want to become, or simply because it feels more natural to me. Maybe it’s a bit of all three.


I’m still not very good, of course. 😄 But I feel like I’m getting somewhere. And that, in itself, is really enjoyable.


I also believe that, for most people, the exploration period eventually comes to an end — and when it does, you’ve hopefully found a setup that really appeals to you, one that you simply want to play with most of the time.


And to reach that point, I think we just need to be a little bit brave. In my case, I went back to a blade that I had previously ruled out as not fitting my style or feeling. I also started to use short pips - which was nothing I wanted to try - but I did it anyway - and I immediately liked it.

You will be new tomorrow and you will be looking for new setups...

 

[kindof99]

Played extremely well yesterday, the haircut buff is real. Hitting a bunch of shots which were just impossible with the damn thing in my face. Must be worth at least 50-100 rating points and not joking this time.

Can confirm my exact DHS B2 that I received is some kind of super-blade, because it feels closer to 500AUD+ blades than the meager sum I paid for it. The W81 reverbs quite a lot and is a bit unpredictable compared to the B2, so it's clear which one is gonna be the main blade. I have some minor gripes with it but I couldn't feel them at all when actually using it.

I might order a B2X later just to EJ a bit but also to replace the W81 and then use whichever of those I like more as the main blade. It's probably also good to have something pretty similar as the backup anyway. I don't hate the W81 so I'll probably just keep it until I find someone who needs it more; it's just the quality you expect from the price, while the B2 I got is way beyond that lol.

You should show us how to improve in table tennis: how your new haircut looks like. I think most people must restrain very hard to not ask you to cut your hair before from your video.

 

[dingyibvs]

You will be new tomorrow and you will be looking for new setups...

You can do that and still stick to the same for the most part! Over the past ~3 years I've been using a 968 variant, 1+ year with the W968, then ~1 year with the Q968, only interrupted by maybe 2-3 months of a FZD ALC in between. Now I've been using the S968 for the past few weeks, with another brief period (~1 week) of FZD ALC in between. For the rubber it's been H3 on the FH almost exclusively, and D09c on the BH maybe 80% of the time. That didn't stop me from trying out a LOT of blades and rubbers during that time though

 

[NextLevel]

So as I did discuss last week and the photos show, I ended up in Germany (left Wednesday from the US, arrived Thursday, left Monday morning, returned Monday afternoon to the US). If I didn't leave early enough, I would have gotten there on Friday night and missed the first day of action. Cost more money to have the extra night but it was for a good cause (and flights were rougher and more expensive on Thursday as well unless you wanted to do multiple stops).

I had conflicting priorities with school and work, but tried my best to keep it focused on TT lol. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I was not the only person from the US, @golden_son was, how he was and I missed it completely, I know not lol. IT was a pleasure to meet him and his wife who did a vacation as part of the trip.

On Friday, I missed the earlier part of the facility tour, but the part I saw was impressive, it reminded me (or made me aware) that Dima played for Duesseldorf in 2008 as the Duesseldorf team (Timo, Dima and Suss) was the German Olympic team! Suss had to retire early with injuries but anyone who knows him or watches his matches could see he had really heavy topspins. They were silver medallists for those not in the know.

Friday, I got to play a few warmup sessions and practice matches. I hit with @Arkady, whose stamina and physical approach to training was intimidating lol. One thing I will say is that the floors at Duesseldorf were extremely absorbing and made me fee absolutely zero pain from impact. It was like a miracle. We need more of such floors all over the world to make table tennis truly special. Then I hit with @jk1980 who thankfully approved of my Zyre 03. He helped me practice my serve and attack as well. Then I hit with @Haito and we played a couple of practice sets. @Haito has a keenly observant table tennis mind and in fact, he is officially Coach Haito. He also has a really well thought out backhand serve, he often stands a bit behind the table, so it is easy to underestimate the amount of momentum on the serve by the time it gets to you and that created a lot of easy errors when I played him as my attitude was to attack everything as much as possible lol. Then I played @latej , who I think easily had the scariest forehand of all the people I played the whole weekend. It cut the table in half for me when I played him as I just didn't think I could win most of the points on anything that went to the forehand half of the table (on serve pop ups, it was mostly worse, though I did have one nice block). But even more than those things, I struggled massively with returning his serves, his reverse and his long dead/topspin. Thankfully, he had problems with my long dead or nospin so a lot of points were decided on serve or serve and attack with occassionally good rallies. But I learned pretty quickly that anytime I switched the rally to forehand, the quality of ball I needed was above my paygrade.

I might have hit with one more player but I do not remember, maybe it was the doubles that I played with @golden_son vs @jk1980 and @Haito (sorry, my memory is down, maybe it was @Tyce . I suck as a doubles player relative to my level, so the result was not surprising lol.

Went back to the hotel with @Tyce and @just_one_more_chop on Friday. Tried to do a lot of things as many issues came up in the US and I still had to work on a few things. Will describe the Saturday and Sunday events later. Chao!

 

[Archosaurus]

You should show us how to improve in table tennis: how your new haircut looks like. I think most people must restrain very hard to not ask you to cut your hair before from your video.

Whenever my regular partner is at the club AND stays long enough for the club to empty enough for some video, then you'll see it. He's got some real tabletennis shoes now and his level has gone up a little bit just from that, so the next video might be interesting. We just couldn't film last time.

I hit at another club today, they watched me serve for a while and hit some self-feed shots and had trouble finding someone who's an appropriate level, because the club lacked intermediate players. It's all beginners/hobbyists or state players. The state players would have rotated with me, but they found a self-proclaimed-ex-junior-champion and we hit casually a bit. Once I figured him out he had no chance and couldn't deal with my serve or forehand at all, but he had a mean flat hit that he could pull out of his ass from weird angles. Eventually I just started practising my backhand flick on his short serves and looping his long serves.

B2 still incredibly amazing. The feedback feels a lot like my old Stiga Allround Evo (that one was a miracle blade as well, super stiff for its model, and with zero~ resonance issues and a very sharp feedback) except it's about as slow in touch play and much faster in rallying shots. Also stupidly easy to block with. The ball also has visibly more spin judging by how it reacts on the ground; this venue had international comp sized courts and my shots were rolling back into the end wall. It might actually just convince me to stop blade EJing, but somehow I know I won't.

 

[Haito]

I didn't play doubles. I think I got to hit with @latej a bit, but my legs died already. The only game I played full power was the first set with you Then I couldn't get to ball in time. Even when playing with @jk1980 I could not get into position to lift the ball on BH. FH I could still lift ok.

Another big issue I figured out thanks to @just_one_more_chop my rubbers were dead AND dirty. Since I thought they are dead, I just took them under kitchen sink and cleaned them with a lot of soap. The water was black... Wouldn't you know it. It helped a lot XD The thing I am really mad at myself, is that I had a set of new rubbers for this particular scenario... I should have just borrowed some glue and put them on...

When I played against @50hz, I could only play first 5-6 points on decent power. Then he smashed me to the ground XD He played excellently. I do not only admire how well he played, but also how repeatable. I could only play the first 2hrs of the event on decent level, and then I degraded to a miserable level.

I've learned a lot over the weekend. I really need to build muscles in my legs and lose another bulk of the weight (started at 132 on Feb, when I was in Dusseldorf I was roughly 105kg). Me and my better half averaged about 16k steps / 12km each day, that did not help the legs recover as well. I am still feeling the exhaustion.

 

[Haito]

@Haito has a keenly observant table tennis mind and in fact, he is officially Coach Haito.

I wouldn't go that far, I just helped the guys to get basics right. All of them made extremely big progress in just the few minutes. I've been fighting my own bad form for so many years, that I modelled something that works every time. And all the guys that bothered to listen got big improvements in repeatability, spin and spin.