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The main point I am trying to make here is that if he has only been playing 2 years and feels he is 2500 USATT, he is perhaps the fastest improving player in the history of mankind. I have had friends make the US national team and medal at the Chinese National games. None of them would be...

Ma Long and XX win!

So you have been playing for only 2 years and you are 2100 TTR? That would mean 2400-2500 in USATT ratings for only playing two years. If you are improving that fast, I worry any advice I give you would slow you down. Keep on doing what you are doing. Ignore any advice from anyone. Once you...

So with respect to form, I have made a few HUGE mistakes listening to coaches and although I did what they said, the results were disastrous. My advice is that if you are improving, keep doing what you are doing. If there isn't something obviously wrong, you just need to practice more. Also...

What is funny about the ML/XX doubles final is that they are facing Xiang Peng who is wearing a Xuperman t-shirt and Huang YouZheng who is on the Beijing Team with Ma Long. I wonder if they will switch teams for fun and make it a Beijing vs Xuperman final. (I know they won't but it would be...

I think having some sort of system before the person serves is a good idea. If they serve this, I will do that. Your system depends on your own strengths and weaknesses. A second tip is to wait until the ball drops down for short serves before you make contact. This will force you to wait...

I think either Mark McGuire or Sammy Sosa (or maybe both) said in interviews that when they took PEDs, it wasn't the extra strength and muscle mass that helped them hit home runs. They said their eyes tracked the ball much easier which allowed them to hit the ball further. If you could tell...

I went to college with a kid who had so much money he probably could hire Ma Long and Liu GuoLiang to be his personal coaches and then hire a province team to be his practice partners if he wanted. He did fairly well during matches and I asked him if he wanted to try to go pro after college...

For sure you want to use many balls when coaching an absolute beginner. However you want yourself to rally with them for the 1st lesson so they can see your proper technique and then you give them feedback as they play. I would save real multiball (where you feed from the side) to do in a...

Teaching shadow strokes is 100% pointless in my opinion. It is also a good way to make a student think "why am I here? This isn't fun!" When I teach someone who is an absolute beginner, I try to do 2 things in a 1 hour lesson. First, I stand diagonally from them like a forehand to forehand...

Also I would bet a rather large sum of money you can start kayaking late in life and still have a chance to go pro. In table tennis if you start at 19 you have a 0% chance of going pro. The current theory in table tennis is it is best to start at age 2 like Harimoto, Matsushita and the Lebruns...

In America how many truly professional players do we have in the USA? Kanak? Maybe Lily. The others have to spend their time coaching or have their families foot the bill. Making a living coaching is way easier and in almost all instances way more lucrative. At a tournament in the USA there...

I am pretty sure the Naresh brothers would not have moved from Ohio, had the club where they made dramatic improvements not been shut down. Then again, maybe they thought "Man we are 2700 in Ohio and on the national team. I wonder if we can beat those 1850 bay area players. You know they say...

I remember when a bay area 1800 player came to Westchester and won the open beating four 2700 players along the way. Bay Area 1800 players are heavily recruited in MLTT because of their incredible skill level compared with other players across the country. Oh wait, that never happened. I...

Yes. You gave it a shot and it didn't work the way you wanted. Just stick with your MLC or try something else.

One thing to be very mindful of is when playing after taking a few years off is to come back slowly so that you don't destroy or tear your muscles. Your nervous system will say "swing fast" when your muscles aren't ready for it. So just do simple drills for a few weeks or months until your...

It is really hard to just "show up" to a club and hope you find someone there to play with that is around your level or will be fun for you to play. You might not even be able to play when the club has open hours. What I advise people to do is to network as much as possible and take people's...

There were a ton of large cracks in the sponge when I took it off. It looked like someone took a knife to the sponge and made long cuts in it without cutting the topsheet. I have no idea what else it could have been. Now I just glue on the rubber and play. If boosting made a dramatic...

I used h3n on the forehand and h8 on the backhand. These were brand new sheets. I applied 1 layer of of haifu seamoon booster. I let it dry for 12 hours. Applied another layer of booster, let it dry for another 12 hours. Then I applied 2 layers of DHS water based glue, letting the first...

I used to play during the speed glue days and boosting the rubber doesn't seem to make that much of a difference to me. It also seems hit or miss how you do it. If you do it wrong, as I learned first hand, you can also destroy your sponge and cause it to fall apart. I just glue the rubber...