NYC Manhattan area?

Okay, from the way you are stating it, you are not wrong. But the way you are stating it makes the term corkscrew meaningless and indicates that, actually, all sidespin loops are basically corkscrew. But then the term corkscrew has lost its actual meaning.

So you described:

1) Y axis = parallel to the ground, an axis that goes side to side (perpendicular to the flight of the ball).

2) X axis = vertical axis.

3) Z axis = parallel to the ground, forward to back.

These three imaginary axes give us a reference point. But are very rarely the actual axis of a table tennis ball in flight. Now I want to add a few more axis reference points for us to understand things better.

a) a 45-degree angle between 1 and 2.
b) a 45-degree angle between 1 and 3.
c) a 45-degree angle between b and 2. In other words this axis is 45-degrees towards corkscrew and 45-degrees towards vertical.

Now, understanding that a ball always only spins on one axis at a time, and the axis could be any 2 points on the circumference of the sphere and pass through the center of the sphere.

Given the fact that there are an infinite number of points on any sphere, there are also an infinite number of actual potential axes.

So if we are talking about a side/top that deviates from 1 towards 2 and from 1 towards 3 like the axis in c, which is closer to the axis of MOST side/top loops than any of the other axes mentioned, THEN when would it be appropriate to call that CORKSCREW?

A judicial answer might be anywhere past that 45-degree marker making it closer to the corkscrew axis than it is towards the topspin axis. But, what if it was 50-degrees towards the corkscrew axis and 80-degrees towards the vertical (sidespin) axis? We would probably consider that regular sidespin a rather than top/side or corkscrew.

And I am going to suggest that, because of the unique characteristics of corkscrew spin, that a ball that is less than 70-degrees forward would make the term corkscrew less meaningful and should just be considered for the axis of spin it has.

A ball that had an axis of 70-degrees or more towards the direction the ball is moving would start to exhibit the actual characteristics of a corkscrew ball where it would fly straighter, it would not arc down or be pulled up and it would not curve very much to either side.

Now, I did not show my heavy sidespin loops at spin. The ones that are flying towards your BH corner and then start curving and land near the FH corner. Those are almost pure side so that when you try to block them as if they were topspin, they drop down off your racket as almost as if they were dead except for the fact that they also get pulled heavily to the side.

But it would really be very hard to use a topspin to create a corkscrew spin.

I know a guy who lobs and he does this stroke from under the ball sideways--out to the side--that is corkscrew. But it would be hard to duplicate that with an offensive stroke.


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Shuki said:

To what degree would you consider a ball spinning on that axis corkspin, how much of the spin has to be in that direction for you to consider it a true corkspin.

Click to expand...

I actually explained this.

UpSideDownCarl said:

A ball that had an axis of 70-degrees or more towards the direction the ball is moving would start to exhibit the actual characteristics of a corkscrew ball where it would fly straighter, it would not arc down or be pulled up and it would not curve very much to either side.

Click to expand...

Now I am not going to claim I am an expert or anything. I am not sure if 70-degrees is actually right. And 70-degrees is 20-degrees short of pure. Where 90-degrees forward from a pure topspin axis would be a pure corkscrew axis.

To create a corkscrew spin, while brushing, the tangential direction of your racket needs to be just about 90-degrees from the direction the ball is going. In other words, your racket needs to be moving parallel to the topspin axis while still projecting the ball forward to get a corkscrew spin.

Here is a hint: if you watch Ma Long serve, on some of his pendulum serves, his racket is moving parallel to the end line of the table from the midline, towards his body rather than how most people do a pendulum with the racket moving somewhat forward. His racket, on contact, is sometimes moving side to side. When he does that from under the ball, that is going to be corkscrew.

But, according to Michael Landers, who did teach me his corkscrew serve, there really are only a handful of people in the world that can actually do it. So, a certain amount of stuff that gets called corkscrew may not be.

But I would say, what should determine if a ball is corkscrew or not should have to do with the axis of spin on the ball and the trajectory during flight and bounce. That is what I would say should determine what spin is on the ball. So if a loop curves and dips, I personally wouldn't call it a corkscrew.

And corkscrew is very easy to return if you either, 1) don't know anything about spin, or if you 2) read it correctly.

If you contact the back of the ball for a regular topspin Vs a corkscrew serve, it will feel like the ball has no spin. So, if MLanders serves his corkscrew serve to a 1000 level player who can't read spin and that player just takes a controlled topspin shot on the ball without knowing what is coming at him/her, it will be as if the serve had no spin. Well, almost: his corkscrew kicks to the side to much for a 1000 level player to track it effectively.

Where that serve proves its effectiveness is when a player reads it as regular side/top and tries to contact the outside of the ball as if it was actually side top. If you do that, the ball goes down and left into the bottom of the net. And if you try to counter it as if it is heavy backspin on that side of the ball, then, on the next serve Landers will give a regular side/top serve that looks just like the corkscrew and it will fly up and to the side instead of down.

But once you correctly start reading the curve in the air and the kick off the table, you start seeing which is side/top and which is corkscrew.

BTW: Michael Landers and Mark Croitoroo showed me how to read the spin on a ball from the arc and the bounce. For reading the spin on a serve, it is harder to be fooled if you are doing all of that and not just trying to read the server's contact.


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Shuki said:

Also when I thought this through I was imagining the red X and blue Z were swapped places. My bad


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Click to expand...

All good. You just changed the meaning of X and Z. The axis for cork is still in the direction the ball is moving and parallel to the ground; and the axis for topspin is still perpendicular to the direction the ball is moving and parallel to the ground.


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Now the real question in all of this is: where is Pnachtwey when you need a good physicist to call everyone idiots, and explain things properly????

Yes, being honest, I do really Mia him and feel bad he is not around.


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Feel better USDC...

42andbackpains said:

Feel better USDC...

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OCDSnarl is better. My dr told me I am basically good to go.

As far as corkscrew, I bet NextLevel could give a decent answer. I have only seen my hook curve from my vantage point. When I hook, I have a decent idea of how much it will curve in the air. I am aiming for an area on the other side of the table. So the trajectory is in my head and has been envisioned as I am contacting the ball.

If it kicked more out towards you than you kept on expecting the two things I would say are, 1) it probably had more topspin on it than you though: more topspin = not corkscrew; 2) it probably also had more spin on it than you thought.

I wasn't looping too fast. But the acceleration in my stroke was decent so I was translating more of my effort into spin than into pace. That was more so vs backspin when I was opening. Which is why, when I did give you 3rd ball openings, they went pretty high and long most of the time.


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UpSideDownCarl said:

Think about corkscrew as the way a football is thrown. A good spiral on a football makes it fly straight. Corkscrew would be that spin and with that spin the ball would not hook. It would fly straight and you would only see the sidespin after the bounce and the bounce would be a surprising kick to the side. The reason, on that shot, that the kick to the side would be surprising is, the ball would have been flying straight. Also, a corkscrew spin would not cause the ball to arc down towards the table. So if it was corkscrew, most of my loops would go long and they would not allow me the big angles I get on them because they would not drop near the net when I want them to.

The axis of the spin on my loop is a pretty simple side top. But it would be cool as hell to be able to get a corkscrew spin off a forehand topspin stroke. But to get that spin your racket would actually have to be moving sideways over or under the ball: forward momentum on the stroke would prevent the corkscrew spin from occurring.

Click to expand...

I use the corkscrew terminology to describe what most advanced loopers do. Side top and corkscrew are the same thing IMO. We can argue the distinction to death but it's potato - potatoe.

Shuki said:

Okay, so we won't classify your hook as a corkspin because it clearly hooks through the air. But could we agree that your hook has some attributes that are similar? The way your ball kicks when it hits the table is similar to the way a topspin ball would kick, but it kick a bit sideways with it's forward kick.

And this could be a major reason why people hit it long. If i remember right when blocking your loops, which initially kept going long, I kept on adjusting incorrectly because what I would see would be that side kick. When I saw the side kick it made me think, to not close my paddle too much over the top since I was just hitting behind the ball and not the way it was kicking.

But then it would keep going long, so I had clearly misjudged how much forward kick was going along with it. And about 10 times in a row I kept just blocking the back of the ball instead of covering it because my eyes were deceiving me. I could only even start to block it when I told myself to ignore my eyes and to cover that damn ball.

Click to expand...

I loop the same way so you will have similar problems against me. The thing is that there is no pure corkscrew spin in TT but you are right. The ball curves in the air because there is no way of getting cork without sidespin in practical table tennis. It just doesn't happen. In theory, forward motion of the ball always adds a topspin effect to the ball and that changes. But the way you know that a spin is more cork than side is how much it reacts when it hits the table. Pure side mostly curves in the air hits the table and continues the curve. Cork hits the table and bounces in a slightly different way from the way it came in. Most people can both sidespin, but they are not.

Also, note that in reality, the ball spins one and only one way even while affected subtly by air currents that decrease or increase its rotation in a certain direction. Corkscrew or sidespin etc. are just ways of describing aspects of that rotation. Even when it comes to serving, side top and corkscrew don't have different definitions for the most part in practice. The approach to returning them is the same.

NL and I messed around after our match in my NYC New Year's adventure and practiced making a few loops with top, some side, and a chunk change of corkscrew. A good hookshot with some cork mixed in is a great pressure shot in a rally, or if you loosen up at impact and slow it all down, you can get a real short near the net short side of table landing and a wicked kick outside after bounce. When a ball is hit right at you, this is a good time to break it out, and so it when your opponent is deep and thinks you are gunna nail it deep on table.

Shuki said:

Yup. Ended that discussion quick.

Thank's NL

Question: What happens when your side top curves enough so the axis that it's spinning on and the trajectory it's going are parallel?

At this point would you just consider it topspin? And since it isn't the initial trajectory that the ball was traveling could this cause someone to be under the impression that it was corkspin?

Click to expand...

I guess you could call it topspin but it is mostly the result of what is more commonly called spin avoidance. I teach people to loop that way all the time. But some people have a hard time listening to me. It's the best way to learn to approach heavy backspin and topspin. I am largely a corkscrew looper, with more arc and curve on the forehand, and more pace on the backhand. When I do it on the backhand with pace, you won't know the difference from topspin. But I do it more to avoid the main spin axis and control heavy spin than to get sidespin per se.

For me, a pure hook is a true sidespin shot - it might get mixed up with the incoming topspin, but it is a sidespin shot. A corkscrew makes contact on the side but plays over the top of the ball. Just like a video I posted for Carl. Because of the mechanics of the human body, if you turn your wrists inwards or finish your stroke towards your forehead after making contact on the side, most loops have an element of corkscrew/side. You can keep the topspin element by finishing more forward or accentuate the side element by hooking or accentuate the cork by coming over. The reason why the cork can never be true cork is that you still want the ball to have forward motion, and that forward motion is what keeps the topspin.

IF you look closely at the technique of this high level Japanese coach, you can see the cork - the technique is called spiral looping and it can be used with inverted or pips, according to the coach.

http://d5f8dr1gz94y6.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/f89a2fc064c1d4f5ab19a0b3a5798a9a.mp4

Here are a couple of sample videos from my practice.



The thing is that when you hit a ball hard, the effect of the spin relative to the speed is reduced and this is what results in the spin avoidance topspins with light sidespin curves. But again, whether they are technically sidespin or sidetop or curve is besides the point. They dip and curve and they are safer for certain kinds of rallying and looping than pure topspin contact. I teach them for looping backspin, countering topspin and attacking short balls. I realize that it is better to teach them early to adults who are not going to be world class players. The goal is to win, not to wait for forever to learn things that people reserve for good players because they are purportedly too advanced to learn.

I coach a lady right now with a 300 rating. When her read of the ball catches up to her strokes, I will post some video. You will be surprised. And she shares some of my medical issues (not saying which).

Now that we have discussed the topic, look at how this guy who is hitting with a guy who we do not know is contacting the ball. Hopefully, you may see something you never noticed before. Like I said, this is advanced contact. I am showing it vs. an amateur so you don't think that he only does it against people at his level.

Here is another more obvious example - notice how the ball kicks out after the stroke. You would think that with all the effort he doesn't need it but he does it anyway.


And Zhang Jike