Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

[Archosaurus]

Ignore all boring table tennis talks. Your new haircut tops them all.

I agree. It's pretty fucked up looking still which is a huge benefit to my game, because the opponent is too busy looking at it and not at the ball. I also miss the ball in a much more efficient way now.

Coaching can go to hell, get a haircut.

EDIT: Bit more EJ talk:

Took off this H3 non-Neo that's been boosted with 4 layers by now, and it hasn't changed hardness *at all* from when I measured it brand new. Like, not even a little bit. In both scales. The min and max is exactly the same, not just the average.

I'm not sure I believe in the whole "boosting damages the sponge and makes it permanently softer" thing.
I think it's just people using up the rubber and damaging it, just like they would if it was unboosted. Then they boost it less every time due to the above superstition and obviously it will perform worse every time due to that.

I'm willing to eat my words but I'm not surprised if nothing changes for another few months.

 

[dingyibvs]

I agree. It's pretty fucked up looking still which is a huge benefit to my game, because the opponent is too busy looking at it and not at the ball. I also miss the ball in a much more efficient way now.

Coaching can go to hell, get a haircut.

EDIT: Bit more EJ talk:

Took off this H3 non-Neo that's been boosted with 4 layers by now, and it hasn't changed hardness *at all* from when I measured it brand new. Like, not even a little bit. In both scales. The min and max is exactly the same, not just the average.

I'm not sure I believe in the whole "boosting damages the sponge and makes it permanently softer" thing.
I think it's just people using up the rubber and damaging it, just like they would if it was unboosted. Then they boost it less every time due to the above superstition and obviously it will perform worse every time due to that.

I'm willing to eat my words but I'm not surprised if nothing changes for another few months.

My H3 gets a bit softer after the first boost, then the hardness stays the same afterwards regardless of how many additional boosts. In fact, I think that's been the case for all my rubbers that I've boosted. It's also correlated by the fact that after the first boost, subsequent boosts no longer really dome or enlarge the rubber significantly.

I've reboosted H3 4-5 times before, and taking off the rubber the first time always yields a rubber much bigger than the blade. This necessitates trimming of the rubber after reboosting and gluing it back on. This is no longer required after the 2nd reboost as the rubber stays the same size.

I think I know why people think it gets progressively softer though. The rubber gets easier to activate with each successive boost but with less dwell, with the biggest difference being between the first and second boosts. Eventually though, it becomes really easy to activate and there's zero dwell, and even when activated the rubber doesn't produce much power. This is probably why people think it keeps getting softer, though measurements wise it makes no difference.

 

[dingyibvs]

Would you say in general I'm too far from the table when I start my backswing on those? Kinda feeling like that.

A little bit, but more importantly I think you need to move your center of gravity a bit more forward during the shot. Basically move the racket closer to the ball using more than just your arm. You can't always get the starting position right, so the key to just about every shot is to give yourself some mechanism to adjust to the ball.

Moving your center of gravity forward during the shot, and you sort of give yourself a bit of leeway in terms of where you start. If the ball is longer than expected then start swinging earlier, if shorter then start swinging a bit later after the body has moved more forward. Either way you catch the ball at the optimal position. If you don't do that then you're stuck with your starting position, which better be perfect.

 

[Archosaurus]

My H3 gets a bit softer after the first boost, then the hardness stays the same afterwards regardless of how many additional boosts. In fact, I think that's been the case for all my rubbers that I've boosted. It's also correlated by the fact that after the first boost, subsequent boosts no longer really dome or enlarge the rubber significantly.

I've reboosted H3 4-5 times before, and taking off the rubber the first time always yields a rubber much bigger than the blade. This necessitates trimming of the rubber after reboosting and gluing it back on. This is no longer required after the 2nd reboost as the rubber stays the same size.

I think I know why people think it gets progressively softer though. The rubber gets easier to activate with each successive boost but with less dwell, with the biggest difference being between the first and second boosts. Eventually though, it becomes really easy to activate and there's zero dwell, and even when activated the rubber doesn't produce much power. This is probably why people think it keeps getting softer, though measurements wise it makes no difference.

That was my experience with every rubber except this specific non-Neo blue sponge, so maybe something's funny with it. I measured it right out of the package and before boosting it and it hasn't changed at all except just after the oil had soaked in before gluing.

Usually it'll be 2deg per layer and then permanently maybe 1 or 2 after that. Maybe if the sponge was pre-tuned it behaves differently?

Gonna be interesting to see how this behaves after a lot of cycles, although honestly I'm not sensitive to rubber speed unless it's really obvious, so I might not really perceive anything.

A little bit, but more importantly I think you need to move your center of gravity a bit more forward during the shot. Basically move the racket closer to the ball using more than just your arm. You can't always get the starting position right, so the key to just about every shot is to give yourself some mechanism to adjust to the ball.

Moving your center of gravity forward during the shot, and you sort of give yourself a bit of leeway in terms of where you start. If the ball is longer than expected then start swinging earlier, if shorter then start swinging a bit later after the body has moved more forward. Either way you catch the ball at the optimal position. If you don't do that then you're stuck with your starting position, which better be perfect.

Yeah I was actually going to comment on that. I watched a bit more and on almost all my forehands I move a little bit to the right and sometimes even to the rear. There's no need to do that for these kind of put-away shots. That probably has a lot to do with the netting as well.

 

[Haito]

That was my experience with every rubber except this specific non-Neo blue sponge, so maybe something's funny with it. I measured it right out of the package and before boosting it and it hasn't changed at all except just after the oil had soaked in before gluing.

Usually it'll be 2deg per layer and then permanently maybe 1 or 2 after that. Maybe if the sponge was pre-tuned it behaves differently?

Gonna be interesting to see how this behaves after a lot of cycles, although honestly I'm not sensitive to rubber speed unless it's really obvious, so I might not really perceive anything.


Yeah I was actually going to comment on that. I watched a bit more and on almost all my forehands I move a little bit to the right and sometimes even to the rear. There's no need to do that for these kind of put-away shots. That probably has a lot to do with the netting as well.

If you have the higher end hurricanes, in my experience, they take much more booster. If your Hurricane has the stiff sponge with line in the back that you can feel under your finger, you need to use stronger booster OR put a lot more of it. When I tried Hurricane I put 3 thin layers of Seamon. It curled a bit but not much softening. Once I got frustrated and done what the person from China in the video has done and just poured the Seamon on the sponge and spread it. Only then it got softer and alive.

 

[blahness]

I feel like my BH loop is very close now. Last two adjustments were 1) keep the racket angle consistent through the final strike, i.e. don't flip the racket. And 2) this is something old but now a focus: move the elbow forward before fixing it during the final strike. #1 really helped with consistency, and #2 really helped with timing.

I'm now starting to work on some BH receives. I still find that to be troublesome especially against reverse spins. They curve away from my BH side so I always feel like the timing is super off. I often end up reaching and doing a very wrist only, weak shot.

On the FH side I ran into an unexpected issue which has led to a wrist injury. Recent efforts to improve power transfer to my arm has worked a bit too well. I neglected to tighten my wrist for the final step and instead just had all that power transfer to a loose wrist, resulting in over rotation of the wrist at the end of every shot. The exact same thing happened during BH training a while ago actually and it's basically the same part of the wrist that's injured (pinky side). Ironically I can now practice BH with full power just fine, but I need to take it easy on the FH side.

Yeah i dont like using BH loop receive against reverse spin either because of the same reasons... way easier to take it with the FH loop if it drifts long (even pivoting if necessary), the margin of error is much higher + you are not fighting the sidespin but rather riding it. Also can be a much stronger shot than the BH opening.

But, with the BH opening you can also do a fake one where you actually just bump the ball forward (with the appropriate angle) on the left side of the ball, and if you sell it well (ie use the loop body movement and supinate forearm after contact like a loop) it kinda looks like a "loop" but in fact is completely fake (and probably even has residual sideunderspin on it) and watch the opponent dump it to the net it repeatedly. Then if they get used to it then just do the real opening loop. I find the BH fake loop to be way more effective against reverse spin serves than other types of serves. So it might be an option too. If the opponent doesnt loop it, it would be a very loose attackable ball.

 

[Der_Echte]

All of you H3 boosting people reallly need to find Sergey the Tsos Unit, undisputed hands down knowledge person in USA, but you gotta get him to join the forum.

#sign-up Sergey

 

[Archosaurus]

If you have the higher end hurricanes, in my experience, they take much more booster. If your Hurricane has the stiff sponge with line in the back that you can feel under your finger, you need to use stronger booster OR put a lot more of it. When I tried Hurricane I put 3 thin layers of Seamon. It curled a bit but not much softening. Once I got frustrated and done what the person from China in the video has done and just poured the Seamon on the sponge and spread it. Only then it got softer and alive.

Mine is the non-Neo one, so no lines and very "dry" feeling, a bit like G-1. Stiff and hard.

It doesn't really react to one layer much at all, but curls a lot after 2. Has been my experience with all H3 and B2, although B2 is a bit stiffer.

Consistently I get about 1.5-2.0deg softening per layer.

 

[Haito]

Mine is the non-Neo one, so no lines and very "dry" feeling, a bit like G-1. Stiff and hard.

It doesn't really react to one layer much at all, but curls a lot after 2. Has been my experience with all H3 and B2, although B2 is a bit stiffer.

Consistently I get about 1.5-2.0deg softening per layer.

I never played neo. The provincial stuff I got had the lines in the back.

PS: What is interesting, the NEW loki Orange sponge has the same thing on the Loki R9.

 

[J-fed]

played a round-robin tournament today. As I was on a bad streak of results this time, i was playing in a lower league level, and finally my RR tournament rating found its bottom level as today i won my group with 4W1L. I played much better than in recent tournaments, and no win was easy except the 1st match where I should have some margin but still i had a scare in G1 as it took me some time to get into the match.
I lost the last match which i knew would be difficult because it was a LP chopper. I think I was playing overall well but i was thinking a bit too much about the outcome, and missed too many chance balls (3) in G2 and G5 was a lottery starting at 6-6; missed another chance ball at 7 all; then he had a lucky edge ball , then he attempted his only counterspin of the match and it was a perfect shot and game over... gg

I won 2000 yens; so with the entry fee of 1500 yens, i netted 500 yens; about 3 usd, i guess im a professional player now.

Basically.

 

[Archosaurus]

I never played neo. The provincial stuff I got had the lines in the back.View attachment 43420

PS: What is interesting, the NEW loki Orange sponge has the same thing on the Loki R9.

Mine's really dark and no lines. 2.15mm. DHS has a ton of OEMs making sponges, so there's no single one.
EDIT: This sponge is also a NIGHTMARE to peel glue off of. It just doesn't want to unstick. It never comes off cleanly like with other sponges.


Wasn't a training session on today, but I thought there was, and I showed up to some mid-division players having private training, so I took over when one of them left. Did some serve/receive and multiball.

Worked on adopting a more high quality pendulum serve body motion and on attacking serves more consistently. Weirdly the multiball was the best session and I killed the hell out of the ball. My legs are done, though.

 

[dingyibvs]

Thinking back to almost 4 years ago when I first started to attempt to rework my technique from the ground up, one of the first things I did was injure my wrist whole trying to develop a BH. I ended up playing through it, using pain as a guide for what NOT to do, and it was very effective in getting rid of excessive wrist usage for my BH stroke. With that in mind, I had an abbreviated practice session today. It was...interesting.

I tried to keep my wrist fixed to start, and eventually with pretty small movements. I had no idea how much my wrist contributed to my control, so many adjustments were done by the wrist! I honestly don't even know what to think of it. Sure, the timing is a bit off without the wrist, but even after adjusting for the timing every shot just felt super off. I'm gonna need to work on this a lot more, I think it'll force me to be much more precise with my arm movement, though I'm still puzzled as to exactly how much I should be using the wrist for adjustments. Maybe some of you have experience with this?

On the BH side, I was a bit frustrated with the lack of translation from robot practice to practicing against my practice partners. I ended up figuring out something new to me, but probably seems quite obvious for most of you who don't do a lot of robot practices. I really need to watch how my opponent is hitting the ball! Robots have variations too, but you can't really see it by how the ball is shot out out, but by how it flies and bounces. As such, I'm used to watching the ball to adjust my stroke. Humans have far more variations, and watching the ball is not enough, I need to pay a lot more attention to how my opponent strikes the ball to get a beat on its trajectory and quality and make most of my adjustments based on that. This isn't obvious in coaching sessions either, as coaches can usually keep the ball pretty consistent whether they're blocking or serving multi-balls.

Anyhow, I'll have to assess how my wrist feels tomorrow to decide if I can continue to train my FH this way. Early on in an injury it might be best to just lay off things altogether and just avoiding triggering motions isn't enough. I'd certainly like to try to practice this less wrist-dependent FH a lot more though.

 

[just_one_more_chop]

Thinking back to almost 4 years ago when I first started to attempt to rework my technique from the ground up, one of the first things I did was injure my wrist whole trying to develop a BH. I ended up playing through it, using pain as a guide for what NOT to do, and it was very effective in getting rid of excessive wrist usage for my BH stroke. With that in mind, I had an abbreviated practice session today. It was...interesting.

I tried to keep my wrist fixed to start, and eventually with pretty small movements. I had no idea how much my wrist contributed to my control, so many adjustments were done by the wrist! I honestly don't even know what to think of it. Sure, the timing is a bit off without the wrist, but even after adjusting for the timing every shot just felt super off. I'm gonna need to work on this a lot more, I think it'll force me to be much more precise with my arm movement, though I'm still puzzled as to exactly how much I should be using the wrist for adjustments. Maybe some of you have experience with this?

I have experincced the almost same thing. For my BH (and on a lesser degree even on FH) I did almost everything with the wrist, which was leading to pain. I could find out which strokes caused more pain and got rid of those, but that really limited the range of strokes I could do.
At the recent TTD Meetup @NextLevel kindly took some time in warmup as he realized my extensive wrist usage in FH and showed me how to perform FH with a fixed wrist (main points for me were 1 keeping the wrist fixed and 2 watching the ball and hitting it constantly with a tight brush over the right upper "corner" of the ball). I was surprised how much easier it was to get a controlled FH and how painfree I could adjust over the next few hours (obviously still missing a lot, after all it is a process).
In the next training sessions I did not focus on getting the highest quality each stroke but rather find a movement that I can replicate constantly. On FH I am a lot more comfortable, so I thought about trying BH aswell.
For me I realized I did not really use my forearn but just the wrist. I tried to mirror the FH movement to the BH and used my forearm to create the power of the stroke itself. The wrist only gets involved to draw back a little before hitting the ball and snap forward on hit. Tried it for a few sessons now and while obviously needing more training time the progress feels good - I get the feeling of being able to control my BH again but without any symptoms of pain.

 

[NextLevel]

Yeah, you're right. I don't know why sometimes I revert back to like 90% brush. Occasionally I can drive more forward and the overall quality is just higher. I think when I'm late at swinging at the ball I tend to do that.

Start by *not* brushing the balls that are well above net height. That is where your issue is most obvious even though it is on many shots. If you can select going through the ball when it is above net height, then below net height it is a matter of experimentation but brushing below net height is the standard recommendation.

 

[NextLevel]

I have experincced the almost same thing. For my BH (and on a lesser degree even on FH) I did almost everything with the wrist, which was leading to pain. I could find out which strokes caused more pain and got rid of those, but that really limited the range of strokes I could do.
At the recent TTD Meetup @NextLevel kindly took some time in warmup as he realized my extensive wrist usage in FH and showed me how to perform FH with a fixed wrist (main points for me were 1 keeping the wrist fixed and 2 watching the ball and hitting it constantly with a tight brush over the right upper "corner" of the ball). I was surprised how much easier it was to get a controlled FH and how painfree I could adjust over the next few hours (obviously still missing a lot, after all it is a process).
In the next training sessions I did not focus on getting the highest quality each stroke but rather find a movement that I can replicate constantly. On FH I am a lot more comfortable, so I thought about trying BH aswell.
For me I realized I did not really use my forearn but just the wrist. I tried to mirror the FH movement to the BH and used my forearm to create the power of the stroke itself. The wrist only gets involved to draw back a little before hitting the ball and snap forward on hit. Tried it for a few sessons now and while obviously needing more training time the progress feels good - I get the feeling of being able to control my BH again but without any symptoms of pain.

In table tennis in general, wrist is overrated, fingers and forearm are underrated. For any two winged player, the placement of the elbow and its role in facilitating consistency are extremely important, when a player is too strong on forehand vs backhand, it is likely because he lacks elbow stability. When they are too strong backhand vs forehand, they tend to lack hip/shoulder rotation.

For you though, since you are extremely tall, you can get a lot out of just controlled forearm usage, your backhand should be extremely powerful and your forehand extremely consistent and powerful, just the footwork to support it will be hard to develop. Really hard for someone of your height to be forehand dominant, though it can happen.

 

[NextLevel]

Thinking back to almost 4 years ago when I first started to attempt to rework my technique from the ground up, one of the first things I did was injure my wrist whole trying to develop a BH. I ended up playing through it, using pain as a guide for what NOT to do, and it was very effective in getting rid of excessive wrist usage for my BH stroke. With that in mind, I had an abbreviated practice session today. It was...interesting.

I tried to keep my wrist fixed to start, and eventually with pretty small movements. I had no idea how much my wrist contributed to my control, so many adjustments were done by the wrist! I honestly don't even know what to think of it. Sure, the timing is a bit off without the wrist, but even after adjusting for the timing every shot just felt super off. I'm gonna need to work on this a lot more, I think it'll force me to be much more precise with my arm movement, though I'm still puzzled as to exactly how much I should be using the wrist for adjustments. Maybe some of you have experience with this?

On the BH side, I was a bit frustrated with the lack of translation from robot practice to practicing against my practice partners. I ended up figuring out something new to me, but probably seems quite obvious for most of you who don't do a lot of robot practices. I really need to watch how my opponent is hitting the ball! Robots have variations too, but you can't really see it by how the ball is shot out out, but by how it flies and bounces. As such, I'm used to watching the ball to adjust my stroke. Humans have far more variations, and watching the ball is not enough, I need to pay a lot more attention to how my opponent strikes the ball to get a beat on its trajectory and quality and make most of my adjustments based on that. This isn't obvious in coaching sessions either, as coaches can usually keep the ball pretty consistent whether they're blocking or serving multi-balls.

Anyhow, I'll have to assess how my wrist feels tomorrow to decide if I can continue to train my FH this way. Early on in an injury it might be best to just lay off things altogether and just avoiding triggering motions isn't enough. I'd certainly like to try to practice this less wrist-dependent FH a lot more though.

I am a huge believer from my years of practice is that it is best to learn to just hit the ball somewhat cleanly and then add to spin to the ball with subtle use of the fingers and larger swing paths. So contact is more important for me than "wrist usage" and "wrist usage" is more finger usage to increase the rotational or speed effect on the ball, especially the rotational effect. For me, the difference between a hit and a spin are subtle, so you could call me a hit/drive spinner especially on the backhand. The forehand is a bit more all over the place since I don't have the footwork to precisely control it so I tend to just accept whatever ball I am given.

 

[boretennis]

Wasn't supposed to be training today, but it ended up being, so I messaged my partner and he even showed up, so here's a bit more video. To get the excuses out of the way, this is after roughly 3.5h of drilling, so we were playing like Ma Long and Fan Zhendong respectively just a few hours prior and you just need to trust me on that one. /s

I'm in the black shirt. These aren't super serious games, we're just practising stuff, but they're not drills either.

Still falling back on some bad habits, but overall more solid. Need to work on physical conditioning and just force myself to not get high and rooted later in the day. Also need to start moving more so I can hit a real shot and not those wimpy stabby forehand block things.

I need to teach him how to receive real serves and tell him to receive more to my backhand to make it more interesting, right now it's mostly high pushes to my forehand although in all honesty I struggle with those, so maybe it's a winning strategy. Serving posture also becomes less dynamic and higher this late in the day; I can do it properly so I just need to make it a habit even if I'm tired.

i would reconsider playing H3 41° and go for something more easy for your level?

 

[Tyce]

I'm feeling very tired for the past few days, probably caught a bug or something. But it's league tonight, hopefully there's something left to use.

 

[Haito]

I'm feeling very tired for the past few days, probably caught a bug or something. But it's league tonight, hopefully there's something left to use.

M2, slept the whole day.

 

[Archosaurus]

i would reconsider playing H3 41° and go for something more easy for your level?

That's what I tried in the beginning when I started playing again. If it had made any difference I'd still be using "easier" setups. I will probably try something "easier" again some time whenever the EJ bug bites me again.


Filmed a lot today, but I don't have time to upload everything, so I will upload some sets. These are from roughly an hour in the session, so still pretty fresh. For the people who don't believe that I don't turn into a pro player just because I'm not tired. I did hit one or two okay shots, but it doesn't mean much because the % is low.

Hard agree on NL's advice to just flat hit everything above the net; chances are I will still spin it too much, but it'd be a step. Shots that I make which feel 100% flat in person are still about 70% brushed on video, so there's a perception issue there.

Footwork towards the ball during the stroke is also about 10% of what it feels like it is, so I need to just really go for it and stop holding back. It's not like I don't *know* how to do it better. Video is good for fixing this because I wasn't even aware before. What feels like excessive to me is still way under half of what is normal.

Apologies for the weird fucking scanline effect on the videos. I think my camera isn't well suited for the frequency of the lights in the venue. It doesn't even do it for every video nor is it related to any setting. It might be related to what it was pointing at when the video starts so I'll try to fix it experimentally later.