Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

Now that unigames is over for me, I have a video of where I am playing very well.
Any comments are welcomed.
He has beaten me convincingly previously, first time 5-1, second time 3-0. I had alot of trouble receiving his serves before.
I have been lucky enough to have my teammate act as a coach and I think strategy is a big part of this match.
Also, just out of interest, what would be the range of my USATT rating?
Thanks guys.

Today I did a non-sanctioned tournament and won 50$. I was the only player that didn't hit out of their hand. No complaints on some of the better illegal serves because it simply means you're going to beat them. Adapting comes quick, because although the illegal serve may be very spinny, it lacks deception, always the same. And I don't know of a single player who has their main serve illegal and short. Step back and win.

Anyway I won the 50$ prize with all 3-0's. Love non-sanctioned tournaments.

JeffM said:

Now that unigames is over for me, I have a video of where I am playing very well.
Any comments are welcomed.
He has beaten me convincingly previously, first time 5-1, second time 3-0. I had alot of trouble receiving his serves before.
I have been lucky enough to have my teammate act as a coach and I think strategy is a big part of this match.
Also, just out of interest, what would be the range of my USATT rating?
Thanks guys.

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ehhhhhhhh, hard to say. Lower than 1800? I forgot what 1800 was like.

Maybe 1600-1700 ish.

songdavid98 said:

From what I see from your serve, is that your movement seems a kind of slow. For the pendulum serve, you should focus most of the power into the wrist. To me, it looks like you are treating the pendulum serve too much like a pendulum. Completely control and whip your wrist. Your forearm guides your wrist, but your wrist does all the work, so don't let it go loose when you swing. I pretty much make my wrist go as fast as it can.


It looks like you aren't accelerating well? Yeah, I just checked in the bathroom mirror: your wrist isn't moving fast enough. It's a bit harder for shakehand, but it's still doable.


And it looks kind of uncomfortable for you.


On the side note:
In this practice video, it looks like aren't even giving yourself enough time to prepare for a good swing, like you were just dishing out balls. Maybe toss the ball higher (tossing the ball higher forces you to have good swing though, so I don't know if it is good for development)?

EDIT: I went back and looked at our game from last year. I guess it's just the way you've been serving.

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Interesting you say that. In this video though, the focus was on getting my elbow high. It's quite possibly that my wrist was slower than usual, but I didn't see that in the spin of the serves. In any case, it will be interesting to see where this all ends - are you playing Butterfly this year?

JeffM said:

Now that unigames is over for me, I have a video of where I am playing very well.
Any comments are welcomed.
He has beaten me convincingly previously, first time 5-1, second time 3-0. I had alot of trouble receiving his serves before.
I have been lucky enough to have my teammate act as a coach and I think strategy is a big part of this match.
Also, just out of interest, what would be the range of my USATT rating?
Thanks guys.

Click to expand...

5:27, now that's a long serve receive.


I feel that RPB is stronger than SH when flicking from the backhand because of the better angle you can get on the ball. Even I've felt the difference between SH and RPB flicking in practice.

Does this make any sense or is it just an individual technique thing?

I had great fun tonight. I got to play two players, both penhold. One is a guy who is pretty solid and plays RPB and is about a level above me. We played 4 matches. It is always great to play this guy. And then I was saying to him that I have not seen this other penhold player who I love to play. There is video of me looping with him blocking from months ago. He is older. He is in his 70s and he plays traditional penhold. And man is he awesome to train with. He is like a wall. Everything comes back. So I had as much fun playing as is possible.

JeffM said:

Also, just out of interest, what would be the range of my USATT rating?

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From this video I'd guess German TTR 1300-1400. USATT is 300-400 points more.

JeffM said:

Now that unigames is over for me, I have a video of where I am playing very well.
Any comments are welcomed.
He has beaten me convincingly previously, first time 5-1, second time 3-0. I had alot of trouble receiving his serves before.
I have been lucky enough to have my teammate act as a coach and I think strategy is a big part of this match.
Also, just out of interest, what would be the range of my USATT rating?
Thanks guys.

Click to expand...

Watching the whole match, now I see why you think you played well, and you did. There is still stuff to work on, but the best part of the match for me is 22:57 to the end. The technique wasn't perfect, but I try to teach people that combination at your level all the time time (slow spin, get the block, kill the block). You need to have that combination down to a science. At a higher level, people will counter the slow spin so you need to get ready to rally or play a faster topspin with the intention of rallying if their counter is too strong vs slower balls, but that combo is one you need to master. At least you did it when it counted. Other times, he missed the first block. But there were some times when you lifted the block or tried to smash it without getting into position and those are the things you need to fix and get your technique for down to a science.

You also struggled a lot with his serve in the first video you showed me and you read and attacked it much better in this match vs other you had shown me. You didn't fall for the after-serve fakes.There is still a lot of work you can do to clean up your forehand technique and even your backhand technique but well done beating him.

Try to review the match and see what happens when you get in the first attack. In the last set, he started trying to wait for your inconsistency. That is why I liked the way you finished the match. But if you can take that point pattern of spin one, attack the block harder and then use it to get to the next level, then you will be on the right path.

Yesterday was a glorious day. Yes, I lost more matches than I won but I beat the 2200+ junior in my club in club matches after having quite a few close 3-2 matches recently. I did lose to a lefty (we split matches 1-1), but the good thing about him is that I need someone to play so I can track the lefty forehand better.

Then me being the idiot I am, I told the junior the strategy I used to beat him. Now I won't be winning any more matches for a few months... but it's okay. This banged up arthritic guy can still play table tennis!

The best part of the day was when he told me that my Tenergy 80 was playing like Hurricane. That one cracked me up.

NextLevel said:

The best part of the day was when he told me that my Tenergy 80 was playing like Hurricane. That one cracked me up.

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Hah, that's a great one.




I didn't get to play at all today, so I just did a few hours of serves and self hitting.

My timing was all whack. Can't get any whip into anything and everything wants to move all at the same time. Couldn't do heavy serves nor could I do any shots with even half decent spin. Just one of those days.

So I thought, okay, whatever, my muscles are starting to ache from trying to make something happen, so I'll just serve "heavy light" serves because you can achieve those without a ton of whip. The kind that are heavy enough to get netted but not heavy enough to really move back into the net with any good speed.

Did probably 2.5 hours of those and light pendulum. Just grooving it in. It went fairly well, they were low at least.

Next step is to get those heavy serves consistent even if I get waken up in the middle of the night and told to do a few!

NextLevel said:

Interesting you say that. In this video though, the focus was on getting my elbow high. It's quite possibly that my wrist was slower than usual, but I didn't see that in the spin of the serves. In any case, it will be interesting to see where this all ends - are you playing Butterfly this year?

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I'm not sure, I'll have to see what my college teams does first.

NextLevel said:

Then me being the idiot I am, I told the junior the strategy I used to beat him. Now I won't be winning any more matches for a few months... but it's okay. This banged up arthritic guy can still play table tennis!

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Sir,

Congratulations!

You obviously are not an idiot. What you did was ensure your Game did not Stagnate and you will Grow from this by letting the junior know the strategy you beat him with. You taught him his Weakness! He will improve and that will force you to Up your Game!

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another."

You have set further along on your Path to Self-perfection!

Congratulations once again!

Shuki said:

Anyway I won the 50$ prize with all 3-0's. Love non-sanctioned tournaments.

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Congrats bro!

JeffM said:

Now that unigames is over for me, I have a video of where I am playing very well.

Click to expand...

Excellent! Congratulations Si-hing!!

UpSideDownCarl said:

I had great fun tonight. I got to play two players, both penhold. ... So I had as much fun playing as is possible.

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How timely and appropriate ... today's Bloomberg Quote of the Day:


"Never, ever underestimate the importance of having fun."
Randy Pausch




pssssttt... penholders are the best! ;-)

'Absorb what is usefu, discard what is useless and add what is specifically your own.'
~Bruce Lee

This is one of the Quotes I live by in my Life. I know I'm not the best, always will be someone better than me, I know I'm not the worst, always will be someone worse than me. I am open to advice and tips on my Path to Self-Perfection. However, People are different... they have different Ways to do things ... they are of varying Experience or Skill levels in their Path ... generally People want to Help.

I keep an Open Mind and Listen. Then I see if it works for me. If i cannot make it work for me, i either keep it in the back of my mind, perhaps due to skill or fitness or whatever i cannot make it work for me now... i may get to a point in the future where it will work for me. So file it away.

Then there may be advice that seems totally off for me, so i may end up rejecting it.

Sometimes i get a tip, but can't exactly do it the way the tip was offered... i adjust for Me... i add what is specifically mine.

So, in a long-winded way, I'm saying TTD is a great resource ... I am grateful for the members and their advice/feedback not just to my questions but to others as well. Lets me see stuff and learn. Although I have old man memory, but the seeds are planted. I will absorb.

THANK YOU TTD!

I close with a quote that sometimes is attributed to Bruce Lee...

"Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do."
~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

songdavid98 said:

ehhhhhhhh, hard to say. Lower than 1800? I forgot what 1800 was like.

Maybe 1600-1700 ish.

Click to expand...

Thanks songdavid98.

Archosaurus said:

5:27, now that's a long serve receive.


I feel that RPB is stronger than SH when flicking from the backhand because of the better angle you can get on the ball. Even I've felt the difference between SH and RPB flicking in practice.

Does this make any sense or is it just an individual technique thing?

Click to expand...

I would not know because I don't really play SH. Do you play PH RBH too? I was chatting with the top penhold player at unigames, and he tells me that he still feels inferior when he plays backhand to backhand against SH players of similar levels.

Xylit said:

From this video I'd guess German TTR 1300-1400. USATT is 300-400 points more.

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Thanks Xylit.

NextLevel said:

Watching the whole match, now I see why you think you played well, and you did. There is still stuff to work on, but the best part of the match for me is 22:57 to the end. The technique wasn't perfect, but I try to teach people that combination at your level all the time time (slow spin, get the block, kill the block). You need to have that combination down to a science. At a higher level, people will counter the slow spin so you need to get ready to rally or play a faster topspin with the intention of rallying if their counter is too strong vs slower balls, but that combo is one you need to master. At least you did it when it counted. Other times, he missed the first block. But there were some times when you lifted the block or tried to smash it without getting into position and those are the things you need to fix and get your technique for down to a science.

You also struggled a lot with his serve in the first video you showed me and you read and attacked it much better in this match vs other you had shown me. You didn't fall for the after-serve fakes.There is still a lot of work you can do to clean up your forehand technique and even your backhand technique but well done beating him.

Try to review the match and see what happens when you get in the first attack. In the last set, he started trying to wait for your inconsistency. That is why I liked the way you finished the match. But if you can take that point pattern of spin one, attack the block harder and then use it to get to the next level, then you will be on the right path.

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Thanks NL, your compliment is too kind, and I thank you for your advice and others' advice leading up to this comp. Yeah, that combination works very well.

Boogar said:

Just started watching it... what is the one counting doing? hahah xD

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Haha, I think he is trying to relax, as we have been playing this competition for days already!
I think some popcorn won't hurt xD

OldschoolPenholder said:

Excellent! Congratulations Si-hing!!

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Thank you Si-hing! Are you even more tempted to use RPB after watching my video?

JeffM said:

Thank you Si-hing! Are you even more tempted to use RPB after watching my video?

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LOL yes ... BUT ... i tried weds night and was hitting all over lol... many advise having a coach properly teach it ... so for now, it's in the back of my mind ... the other thing in the back of my pea brain is switching to short pips LOL

seems everyone did well yesterday. I have my intramural semifinal match today. Pretty confident in winning all the way to the finals. Can't wait for that intramural champion shirt >=]. When people ask which intramural I was the champion of, I'm feeling either heavyweight fighting of some sort. Or Basketball, since KU is a basketball school after-all I feel that would be just as fun as the skinny dude winning heavyweight fighting =]