Transition from a more traditional to a shallow grip

ttmonster · Mar 28, 2016

Hi Fellow members I have always played with a more traditional grip where the fore finger and the thumb was almost totally on the rubber.

My playing still is shake hand , close to the table loop drive on the backhand and looping from mid distance . I generally like to attack third ball if the return is half long, if its too long, I try to spin high the third ball and then attack the fifth ball.

My return of serve improved considerably when I switched to hurricane on the forehand and taught myself to go around the spin axis till I am comfortable with taking the spin head on.

My current issues :

1. Transitioning from backhand loop drive to backhand loop from mid distance. My knees are weak and sometimes I am out of position, so I want to have a more free flowing game instead of getting stuck in single style, european or otherwise.

2. I tend to over move on my wide backhand , especially when I am close to the table and late in reading the ball, he same thing happens sometimes on the forehand especially with spins coming into the body. But the latter is less infrequent.

3. Because of my weak left leg, I have the habit of the left leg going up sometimes. When I am conscious my forehand is more compact and quality.

Now, I found that the inner head of triceps especially the part connecting to the forearm on the inside is becoming very sore of late whenever I am playing more than I should

..

I figured if I can loosen my grip further and change to a shallow grip with my thumb barely touching the rubber and more wrapped around the end of the handle and the forefinger just finishing on the rubber , it might resolve a couple of issues , especially the transitions from backhand loop drive to loop. I tend to lock my wrist on the inside to get my elbow stable on the backhand to get my form correct and may be the more traditional grip is not tensing up the muscles in the arm. Also, I am guessing I will be able to gain a few more microseconds when transitioning from my serve grip to my regular grip.

I was trying it out last evening in shadow practice, it seemed that pressure transition from forefinger to thumb while transitioning from forehand to backhand is more natural in the shallow grip. I am hoping it will increase my feeling and even though I lose a little bit of control early on , it might actually help in the long term.

Any thoughts, suggestions , tips or warnings guys ?

NextLevel · Mar 28, 2016

I have done something similar to you recently. I keep forgetting my grip and I keep having to remind myself of what it should be. But it is the best thing I ever did and I wish I had committed to it much earlier.

Grip change is always fun for me - good luck with it. Need some video to really help but I think your goals are well motivated if my experience is relevant.

ttmonster · Mar 28, 2016

Thanks NextLevel assurance from you definitely helps , I will try to up a video as soon as I lose another 20 pounds

, just kidding may be that will help me to stick my weight lose regime

NextLevel said:
I have done something similar to you recently. I keep forgetting my grip and I keep having to remind myself of what it should be. But it is the best thing I ever did and I wish I had committed to it much earlier.

Grip change is always fun for me - good luck with it. Need some video to really help but I think your goals are well motivated if my experience is relevant.

NextLevel · Mar 28, 2016

ttmonster said:
Thanks NextLevel assurance from you definitely helps , I will try to up a video as soon as I lose another 20 pounds , just kidding may be that will help me to stick my weight lose regime

The thing is that what you might think is a shallow grip is possibly a very standard TT grip. Lots of people still think the ideal neutral TT grip is the grip players were using in the FH dominated era of TT. MY grip has my long finger coming off the blade face. So it is still deep, but it is as low as possible off the blade while still deep. I may do a video on it sometime. Some people think it looks funny but it is actually very similar to what Brett recommended in his grip video.

Archosaurus · Mar 28, 2016

I think grip is one of those things that you shouldn't really try to change by itself unless you simply don't know how to hold the paddle.

What I've heard from very high level people is that you will eventually train yourself a better grip if you focus on not being so tense and being able to vary where you contact the ball. Although that comes from people who have been playing tens of years since they were kids.

I learned fairly late and am definitely not talented, but I've never had problems with my grip. I just focus on holding it in a way that I'm relaxed and I can move it around in my hand and can do all my strokes ie: can get all the angles.

My grip has a bias to be more closed on the backhand and more open on the forehand and it's really deep, but it's not something really extreme and doesn't feel like there's an actual bias nor does it feel so deep that I can't be relaxed.

The biggest problem I've personally had is whipping the paddle into my right leg from my forehand backswing when I get caught with a surprise ball to my backhand.

EDIT: Here, I took the first bat I had on hand (Unopened premade turd

) and made an example of what I think is a "good" grip and a "bad" grip. The only difference is that one is less relaxed than the other.

http://imgur.com/a/0LAxp

I'm not telling which is which, though. You should know that yourself. Think of "fingers vs palm".

ttmonster · Mar 28, 2016

I am thinking more of the pinchy grip that Ben refers to below ...

Archosaurus · Mar 28, 2016

http://imgur.com/a/Z878c

It might look like I'm not pinching it, but that's probably just due to the huge handle and my short fingers.

It's hard to really show what you're talking about when you're talking about grip: a video is better because it's the feel that counts.

In fact, I developed my grip from that video and some coaches' advice on pinching with the forefinger and thumb.

Or am I doing it wrong?

EDIT: Oh, one thing to take into account. My biggest concern with my grip is that I can play a good backhand in an instant. I'm a "forehand player" but my forehand isn't really aiming to be uber powerful nor do I play in the old one wing looping style. So my grip is perhaps more towards a deeper defensive grip than a pure offensive attacking grip. I still consider it shallow enough to allow good wrist movement and spin.

Maybe as my level increases, it will change.

ttmonster · Mar 28, 2016

Its a continuous process Archosauras , since its a technique sport , you have to keep revisiting the fundamentals whenever your level increases a little bit. I started thinking about this since I had a coaching session after a long time and I did pretty well and noted down what my coach said I need to improve.

In table tennis a lot of techinque flows / game situations, keep repeating from one level to the next , the fundamentals remain the same but the nuances keep becoming more and more finer.

You will appreciate it more when you manage to put together the funds to buy a decent paddle that is not pre-made with modern rubbers and find a way to get access to play in a club or in a group where you have people who have played this sport for a considerably long time, preferably starting well before your time

Archosaurus said:
http://imgur.com/a/Z878c

It might look like I'm not pinching it, but that's probably just due to the huge handle and my short fingers.

It's hard to really show what you're talking about when you're talking about grip: a video is better because it's the feel that counts.

In fact, I developed my grip from that video and some coaches' advice on pinching with the forefinger and thumb.

Or am I doing it wrong?

EDIT: Oh, one thing to take into account. My biggest concern with my grip is that I can play a good backhand in an instant. I'm a "forehand player" but my forehand isn't really aiming to be uber powerful nor do I play in the old one wing looping style. So my grip is perhaps more towards a deeper defensive grip than a pure offensive attacking grip. I still consider it shallow enough to allow good wrist movement and spin.

Maybe as my level increases, it will change.

Archosaurus · Mar 28, 2016

The only generalization I can make is that it's better to grip too loose than too tight.

I know this one absolute beginner who holds the paddle basically nearly hanging from the middle of the handle, extremely loosely. His attacking stroke is a really big whip with bad form, but it kinda works because of how damn loose the grip is.

It's funny watching all the really tight players who play him go and throw the game because he manages to block back their big flat hits.

There's no other merit to his game, but there'd be no merits at all if he just squeezed it!

ttmonster · Mar 28, 2016

We have a similar player in our club too, he is naturally gifted with good reflexes and is very quick. He can stand virtually on the table and keep swinging away and land everything. The moment you start making it slow and spinner , he starts loosing his "touch" ... thats the way it rolls at that level ...

Archosaurus said:
The only generalization I can make is that it's better to grip too loose than too tight.

I know this one absolute beginner who holds the paddle basically nearly hanging from the middle of the handle, extremely loosely. His attacking stroke is a really big whip with bad form, but it kinda works because of how damn loose the grip is.

It's funny watching all the really tight players who play him go and throw the game because he manages to block back their big flat hits.

There's no other merit to his game, but there'd be no merits at all if he just squeezed it!

Archosaurus · Mar 28, 2016

ttmonster said:
We have a similar player in our club too, he is naturally gifted with good reflexes and is very quick. He can stand virtually on the table and keep swinging away and land everything. The moment you start making it slow and spinner , he starts loosing his "touch" ... thats the way it rolls at that level ...

You just described my guy exactly.

I played him once, and just kept throwing really soft spinny loops at him, coupled with heavy backspin serves. He tried attacking it and kept putting it wherever: in the net, off the edge, in my face.

He quit at 7-0.

NextLevel · Mar 29, 2016

ttmonster said:
I am thinking more of the pinchy grip that Ben refers to below ...

So one of the big details Ben gets wrong is that he assumes the something wrong with having the finger come off the paddle because he doesn't see that happening with many higher level players. There is absolutely nothing wrong with it. In fact, Ben arguably seats the racket far too much in his palm - mine is more in my fingers.

Archosaurus · Mar 29, 2016

NextLevel said:
So one of the big details Ben gets wrong is that he assumes the something wrong with having the finger come off the paddle because he doesn't see that happening with many higher level players. There is absolutely nothing wrong with it. In fact, Ben arguably seats the racket far too much in his palm - mine is more in my fingers.

Finger length, but also flexibility and muscular balance is important to consider.

Pro players have different hand muscle balance than us commoners, even if by a little.

Der_Echte · Mar 29, 2016

Monster, show me a pic of exactly where on your triceps you are talking about please, use Powerpoint of something to draw an arrow... Like this pic.

This is where I nearly tore my rotator cuff completely off last winter.

BLUE · Mar 29, 2016

This whole grip topic is quite difficult to discuss online. I'd love to have you here with me in person. So I could just explain my thoughts more direct and with some visual and tactile feedback before feeding you multiball to show you the differences.

The video isn't bad, but in my eyes that guy throws a lot of different stuff in a mixer and stirs it up. To me it is a bit confusing and messy. I'm not even quite sure if he has understood "why" certain grips do better or worse in certain scenarios or if he just did some trial and error and learned by doing (which isn't necessarily a bad thing, since the only thing that matters, is that he finds a grip wich is suited to his playing style and technique).

The grip is a really really really important factor to playing table tennis. It's the point between your material and your body!
That is, why it's the first thing, which is taught to anyone who starts playing table tennis. In the past years I have surely trained over 100 different players (mostly children), and let me tell you one thing: That equals over 100 grip styles as well (unfortunately only one penholder though

).
Some had the fortune to hold the racket naturally quite well while others had big problems with adopting a more suited grip.
Every hand, every arm, every style and last but not least many racket handles as well are different. So there isn't the ultimate, exact grip! But there are many "wrong" ones, or better grips which give you considerable disadvantages.

Beside the factor of "pinching" or not, the position of the fingers themselves and (this goes hand in hand) especially the angle of the racket in your hand are of utmost importance!

When I teach children, I always start with the rough and basic stuff and step by step (and these steps may take years!) I go into more and more details. When there is a solid basis and a basic understanding of the strokes and table tennis as such, often little changes can unlock blockades and lead to a lot of improvements.

Maybe if you could upload some more videos I could give you my personal opinion. If I find the time I will upload some pictures tomorrow and have my try at explaining my key views.

I really look forward to hear your views. In the past few weeks a lot of people talked to me about this loose grip topic. Maybe Der_Echte and USDC and NL can have their go as well. Allthough I'm quite scared of them and their secret goon squad stuff. They seem rather dangerous and even more powerful than Ovtcharov's backhands in the semi final. Maybe some day I'll be worthy enough to join this elitist group of mysterious legends, but untill then I can only wonder about their hieroglyphic messages they often leave us mere mortals. But unraveling the hidden messages behind the blurry lines is easier said than done

Now hurry up! I think they might have traced my location (plz send help)

Der_Echte · Mar 29, 2016

BLUE, one of the apps you downloaded uses the LOCATER feature of your OS... it is too late. Even if you turn off your phone, it will still tell them your location. One way out is to quickly stuff the handy in the pocket of a bike messanger... better they bump him off than you... A handy you can always replace and it is a snap to reload your contact list.

I treat my grip like I treat holding and lining up my sights with a rifle. You want a consistent place where you place your cheek the same way the same place every time that will not move. I grip up on the bat so that the area between my thumb and forefinger is right up against the side of the neck. I can be consistent in placing my hand right there every time, and I can change my grip when needed, and get it back quickly without looking, it takes just a loosening and a movement up until I feel the side of the neck and I am back at base position again. Some say never adjust grip, but sometimes you need it to optimize a shot. Keeping grip same is also good in that you are consistent. If you can stay comfortable and consistent, that counts.

The big point I was making in the previous thread that got Monster to make this thread was a different point altogether, but a real important one. I frequently bring this up when forum members talk about how a shot and impact goes and what affects it, but forget a very important factor: GRIP PRESSURE AT IMPACT.

That changes every thing: Your blocks, your loops, your no spins, you name it. It is a kind of touch and it is invisible, unless you can see the ball really well.

KJH teaches BH defense very close to table with a very loose grip to safely send back fast drives off the bounce, firmer grip for faster block allowing ball to come higher. I really loose stroke with a sudden firming right before and at impact produces a really powerful ball without a lot of backswing. These are some of the things grip pressure at impact affects the result. It is impossible to measure, but masters of touch use this to win points over and over.

Another thing Monster mentioned in the thread that got him to post this was the use of wrist. I am much like what KJH teachs in that respect, close to table, not a lot of time in fast exchanges, so make stroke real compact using a lot of lower arm going forward on both BH and FH, very little wrist on BH close to table in fast exchange, and away from table more from side and more wrist with BH loop. On FH loop I use the "Ulnar to Radial" direction of wrist on my FH loops, and on a straight BH flip use the same with a little of the "supinition/pronation". On a FH shot, I am against the "Slap" for most shots, but if there is time, why not? On BH wing, I use a very short "Flexion/Extension" slap to make a BH fast drive faster than a lot of player's FH smashes, I get good effecient energy transfer on BH wing better somehow.

My nuetral grip pressure is normally very loose, especially on serves. The grip pressure I use will depend upon the kind of impact I am trying to get. Some shots require a 30-40 percent power and a looser grip, while most of my best topspins and fast shots have it all loose, right until I impact, and then it is sudden firm, real firm.

ttmonster · Mar 29, 2016

Der_Echte this is where the pain is ...

Der_Echte said:
Monster, show me a pic of exactly where on your triceps you are talking about please, use Powerpoint of something to draw an arrow... Like this pic.

This is where I nearly tore my rotator cuff completely off last winter.

View attachment 9592

ttmonster · Mar 29, 2016

Thanks Blue , I tried to make a video today. We spent two and a half set trying to look good on the video , finally after hitting some out of the world loops on corners found that my dear friend did not press the record button !!!!!!! I was too tired to do it all over again !!

Anyways, I will try to get a video of me showing my grip and then some of me playing ...

BLUE said:
This whole grip topic is quite difficult to discuss online. I'd love to have you here with me in person. So I could just explain my thoughts more direct and with some visual and tactile feedback before feeding you multiball to show you the differences.

The video isn't bad, but in my eyes that guy throws a lot of different stuff in a mixer and stirs it up. To me it is a bit confusing and messy. I'm not even quite sure if he has understood "why" certain grips do better or worse in certain scenarios or if he just did some trial and error and learned by doing (which isn't necessarily a bad thing, since the only thing that matters, is that he finds a grip wich is suited to his playing style and technique).

The grip is a really really really important factor to playing table tennis. It's the point between your material and your body!
That is, why it's the first thing, which is taught to anyone who starts playing table tennis. In the past years I have surely trained over 100 different players (mostly children), and let me tell you one thing: That equals over 100 grip styles as well (unfortunately only one penholder though ).
Some had the fortune to hold the racket naturally quite well while others had big problems with adopting a more suited grip.
Every hand, every arm, every style and last but not least many racket handles as well are different. So there isn't the ultimate, exact grip! But there are many "wrong" ones, or better grips which give you considerable disadvantages.

Beside the factor of "pinching" or not, the position of the fingers themselves and (this goes hand in hand) especially the angle of the racket in your hand are of utmost importance!

When I teach children, I always start with the rough and basic stuff and step by step (and these steps may take years!) I go into more and more details. When there is a solid basis and a basic understanding of the strokes and table tennis as such, often little changes can unlock blockades and lead to a lot of improvements.

Maybe if you could upload some more videos I could give you my personal opinion. If I find the time I will upload some pictures tomorrow and have my try at explaining my key views.

I really look forward to hear your views. In the past few weeks a lot of people talked to me about this loose grip topic. Maybe Der_Echte and USDC and NL can have their go as well. Allthough I'm quite scared of them and their secret goon squad stuff. They seem rather dangerous and even more powerful than Ovtcharov's backhands in the semi final. Maybe some day I'll be worthy enough to join this elitist group of mysterious legends, but untill then I can only wonder about their hieroglyphic messages they often leave us mere mortals. But unraveling the hidden messages behind the blurry lines is easier said than done

Now hurry up! I think they might have traced my location (plz send help)

ttmonster · Mar 29, 2016

Apologies for the badly taken photos and the background ... just in case it helps ...

Here are some pictures of my current grip ...

And this is what I am trying to change to ...

Archosaurus · Mar 29, 2016

I've been wondering.

Is the grip firmness at impact good because it reduces shakiness, or because it raises the spring rate = "hardness" of the bat head, or both?

Should I be thinking about it like a dynamic spring, or to add "weight" onto the stroke for a split second?

Transition from a more traditional to a shallow grip

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Similar threads