Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

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I am looking for a video. I remember a scene from it where a ball machine throws new produced balls at a woman (?) and she selects and sorts them according to their trajectory and landing point. Maybe it was a video about how table tennis balls get produced and their quality tested?!

Anyone has an idea of which video I am talking?
 
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I had a team tournament today.
played in our B team. Our A team hired a new very good player who took my place :-/
so i was in division 5 (instead of division 3).
The good thing is i had a lot more matches. Our B team finished 3rd of our 5-team block, that was the objective. I played 4 singles, won 3 lost 1, and 4 doubles, won 2 lost 2.

Regarding the 3 matches won, two I struggled a bit in the 1st game, but once i got it, i crushed them in game 2 and 3 to win 3-0. Victory was totally normal.

The 3rd win was against a decent chopper. I think he was about my level or slightly below. I played very solidly. The guy was consistent, and had flash surprise FH attacks but from a bit far from the table, and i blocked very well. We were tied 1-1 and fighting game 3 in a tight contest, it was a good game. I won the 3rd with a bit of luck at 9-9 (net ball for me) and a good 3rd ball attack following to his body, whereas i had aimed for wings the whole match so far :)
I crushed the guy 11-2 in the 4th game, I am happy with my performance.

The game i lost was against a leftie penholder who had only rubber on one side. I lost 1-3. I have regrets because the guy didn't look that good, but he was pretty consistent, not many unforced errors, his serves were not very spinny but a bit deceptive. and he exposed several weaknesses of me and took advantage: tricked me with his spin/nospin serves. Served wide to my FH to force me to attack and blocked straight to my BH side, i was systematically late on that one.

I didn't find a good solution to this today, and my BH serve didn't affect him a lot. I have regrets not having tried too much other tactics. I feel like I haven't played all my cards while the guy only had one set of cards, but played it very well. I lacked a bit of confidence in this match. Its not shameful to have lost this game, I had some good wins recently but I think i was the one expected to win.

I have another team tournament tomorrow, I hope I'll play a bit better
 
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This is great to hear Jeff !! I am convinced that you are on the right track ! Don't you have any local weekly leagues that you can play regularly ?
Update on my recent TT activities:
Since my defeat at the competition 2 weeks ago, Ive been getting more coaching. I've also trialed different coaches, and found that each has a different approach, and that this may be a good thing for me, as one may be from an older generation, and the other have a more contemporary style. I've also received a lesson from a coach who came here for one month from China, and again, different style, but made me realize what I was doing wrong.

My main issue is still the movement, which I think has definitely improved with the coaching as well as my persistence in exercising daily. The other issue is the match thinking, i.e. the understanding of ways to obtain points in a match, which I think comes with how often I play and can be lost if I don't play matches for a long time.

Tuesday I filled in for a pennant match, and had to play against 3 shakehanders (2 anti-spinners and 1 inverted). To my surprise, I was able to win all of them, but not without difficulty. I recorded the matches and there were some great points. I was glad I have the opportunity to practice against this style, as well as to put the strategies that my coach taught me in practice.

I have been able to put much more time into TT this rotation as my roster is relatively stable, and I think the coaching is definitely a motivation for me to get better!
 
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This is great to hear Jeff !! I am convinced that you are on the right track ! Don't you have any local weekly leagues that you can play regularly ?
Thanks ttmonster!
There are local weekly leagues, but they require early registration (which I sometimes do not know what my roster will be like) and the duration is often beyond my knowledge of what my roster will be.
So I have just been playing opportunistically, as a sub.
 
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Todays team tournament

Team lost before the tournament even started. One of our members defected at the last minute for personal reasons.
As we had paid in advance and made the effort to come, we could play some scheduled matches, but our results would not be taken into account and we couldn't advance to the upper division even if we won our block.

I won my 4 singles out of 4, and 1 doubles out of 2. I think my victories were "normal" but I had some tricky experienced opponents with LP, I struggled a bit before finding the good rhythm. I played very seriously, and i think its all good wins like yesterday. There were a lot of matches where i struggled 1 set (or even more) but when finally unleashed i scored many points in a row in all-attacking style, it felt like shooting sitting ducks at times LOL.

Even i didn't play some very strong opponent in those 2 days, i feel i've really improved recently and happy about that :)
 
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Hi guys, thinking of getting a new blade.
Would you guys recommend lacquering it?
Would doing so actually change the playing characteristics of the blade? (Stiga Xu Xin Blade)
Thanks!

The Dynasty blade, in the Xu Xin edition? It has koto outers. In my experience that doesn't splinter nearly as much as some other woods (spruce, limba) do.

It's not a must per se, but as long as you seal it very lightly play will not be affected, or negligibly so.

In Dan's review, he characterizes it as a hard, fast blade. Are you game?
 
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The Dynasty blade, in the Xu Xin edition? It has koto outers. In my experience that doesn't splinter nearly as much as some other woods (spruce, limba) do.

It's not a must per se, but as long as you seal it very lightly play will not be affected, or negligibly so.

In Dan's review, he characterizes it as a hard, fast blade. Are you game?

Thanks yoass, yeah I am going to give it a try. :)
I cannot resist a blade named after XX, and now is the best time to get it when he is no 1 hahaha.
 
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Thanks yoass, yeah I am going to give it a try. :)
I cannot resist a blade named after XX, and now is the best time to get it when he is no 1 hahaha.

Heh. I strongly suspect it's a great blade. Koto's a wonderful outer, and my experience with thickish cores is also very positive. And it's a beaut.
 
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Heh. I strongly suspect it's a great blade. Koto's a wonderful outer, and my experience with thickish cores is also very positive. And it's a beaut.

Just bought it from tabletennis11, there is a sale on currently!
Very excited to try it when it arrives! Can't wait!
 
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Regarding Koto outer, the DHS H301 has Koto outer as well and there seem to be several reports about it splintering easily.

The Dynasty blade, in the Xu Xin edition? It has koto outers. In my experience that doesn't splinter nearly as much as some other woods (spruce, limba) do.

It's not a must per se, but as long as you seal it very lightly play will not be affected, or negligibly so.

In Dan's review, he characterizes it as a hard, fast blade. Are you game?
 
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Regarding Koto outer, the DHS H301 has Koto outer as well and there seem to be several reports about it splintering easily.

I had heard about that before, and all too conveniently forgotten. My own experiences with koto blades are different, but then I've never had a H301.

I have come across splintering blades (Stiga, Joola) when gluing rubbers for myself and others. I have a little tube of wood filler handy, part of my gluing kit; and I have taken up the habit of sealing blades, or having them sealed. Many TT shops over here offer that as a service, usually free of charge upon purchase or else for a very little fee.
 
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Just bought a Stellan Bengtsson Offensive Wood for fun. Got it for 50 kronor which is around 5 USD. I am a little interested in how it plays and what it is worth. To bad it is pretty worn, but still fun. Can post a picture later!
 
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Just bought a Stellan Bengtsson Offensive Wood for fun. Got it for 50 kronor which is around 5 USD. I am a little interested in how it plays and what it is worth. To bad it is pretty worn, but still fun. Can post a picture later!

I started out with that blade, as a hand-me-down. On the first rubber change, a large strip of the top veneer (over a cm wide) came loose, and the TT shop tried bravely to restore it by using wood filler, and a lot of patience and sanding.

I was soooooo lucky because in the club someone saw me struggle with that restored blade (it never played that good, restored, with strange vibrations and a sweet spot reduced to the size of a handful of needle pins) and gave me a Kjell Johansson Offensive Wood. Played that for years, then quit the game for a couple of decades. And somehow managed to lose it in the meantime, or I gave it away; can't recall, too long ago...

My Stellan Bengtsson had an anatomical handle. Before it got damaged, it played with lots of feeling, a very precise touch game, and amazing power when really engaging it and ripping through the ball with the blade's center. Even without damage its sweet spot was rather small. Coin sized.

And it spun to no end. I don't think I'm getting the curves right now that I got back then, using that Offensive Wood with Mark V and the 38mm celluloid ball. it really felt like chewing on the ball for a bit before spitting it back out.
 
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DAMN LULA !!!

If you can easily get these kind of blades for that kind of money, acquire some for me !! I will visit you in person next time I am in Sweden to pick up my next Volvo... hopefully a V90 AWD T6 if they still make by then. I would pay you in Kronor, Deutschmark, Swiss Franc, Bitcoin, Confederate Dollar, or whatever currency you choose.

TTD member erm may be quite interested in those, he knows Stellan personally from his years in San Diego.

Erm once had Hungarian blade makers recreate a perfect copy of his old blade and presented it to him as a gift years back.

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk
 
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I believe that all Stellan Bengtsson blades from the mid 80ies to the 90ies have got ST handles. Rather thick if I remember it correctly. The old Tickan AN handles are just amazing when it comes to comfort. The recent Stiga AN handles are horrible compared to what they used to produce in Tranås.
 
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I believe that all Stellan Bengtsson blades from the mid 80ies to the 90ies have got ST handles. Rather thick if I remember it correctly. The old Tickan AN handles are just amazing when it comes to comfort. The recent Stiga AN handles are horrible compared to what they used to produce in Tranås.

My AN Stellan OW was from around ‘78, ‘79. Maybe ‘80. I did not know about ST ones being made later. Still called Offensive Wood, and with an outer of walnut (iirc)?
 
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My AN Stellan OW was from around ‘78, ‘79. Maybe ‘80. I did not know about ST ones being made later. Still called Offensive Wood, and with an outer of walnut (iirc)?

I believe that it was a marketing thing when they introduced the handles with lenses.
ST = Stellan
AN = Tickan
FL = Alsér

I believe that they all came as all, off, def.

Google “Stiga stellan bengtsson”
 
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I believe that it was a marketing thing when they introduced the handles with lenses.
ST = Stellan
AN = Tickan
FL = Alsér

I believe that they all came as all, off, def.

Google “Stiga stellan bengtsson”

My Stellan Bengtsson had a lens, and was AN. And I actually thought all SB blades in the Offensive Wood line were AN, but you're saying I'm wrong and what I'm seeing is in line with that. My SB OW (AN) must have been an anomaly, or perhaps somebody had been swapping lenses... but I don't recall ever seeing anybody using an Ulf Tickan Carlsson OW blade. Ah well.
 
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