Great question PierreAd!
Hey guys, I'm really curious... We all are penholders here and, from what I can see, many of us play in parts of the world where shakehand grip is ultra-widespread, and penhold grip is almost non-existent.
I'm wondering how you managed to learn penhold in the first place, and how you keep improving your game and your technique when there's likely not many penholder players (and therefore not many PH coaches) around. How do you discover flaws in your technique, how do you correct them?
My father played with his friends as I watched when I was a kid. He as well as his friends played PH.
In Middle School and High School (~age 11+, grades 6-12, before College/University), I played with classmates/friends as there was a table in our school's gym. During middle school, one of my friends said there is a Dept of Park Recreation Center near where we live where it's free to play. So Fridays after school, we went and played. I had an illegal sidespin serve, where I threw the ball into my racket as I did a BH serve TPB style. I usually won off my aces back in the 21/5 era. If partner returned the serve, usually it's popped up high and I smash usually for a winner.
Sometime in high school, my dad told me of a club in Chinatown and that a member of the China Team was there and that he may be able to get that China Team member to teach me a little. That club in Chinatown ~1978 or 1979 to 1985 or so, was one of the go-to clubs in NYC during the 1980's. Members affectionately called it 'The Firehouse' as the club was in an old NYC firehouse which had 3 bays that could fit 3 firetrucks. 6 tables with ample room for chairs on the side inside the table area sectioned off by metal bars drilled into ground and cloth was put on as barriers.
Alex Tam was that former China Team member. IIRC, he was #14 in the world and didn't get much play time, so he literally swam from China to Hong Kong. Then he somehow made his way to the USA where he was ~2500 level. He was a TPB short pips 2 winged attacker.
Alex showed/taught me some basics of PH short pips play back when there was no RPB and all PH played with 1 sheet of rubber and bare wood on the back. This was before the days of the 2 color rule and no wood allowed to hit the ball. So on some shots, i would use the wood to return the ball and sometimes it floated back funny. Then sometimes 1982-1985, rules changed to the 2 color rule. I recall Cai Zhenhua dominating with his SH style of Anti on backhand side and tacky rubber on FH and he flipped under the table and his opponents didn't know what to expect. Some said the rules change was to prevent Cai's style. Guo Yuehua, one of the PH gods, was the world champ back then.
Anyway, Alex didn't really "coach me" coach me, just hit with me a few times, and had me hit with one of his top students, Richard Ling. Oldschool TT players in the NYC area during the 1980's and 1990's should know of Ling as he coached many players as well as forum member/mod Carl! Richard was awesome, sometimes Tam would watch on the side. Richard and I didn't really drill basics as much, but he taught me a lot about the game. I was also coached a little by Doon Wong (~1800) and his daughter Vicky Wong (~1900-2000). Both Doon and Vicky really helped me (and my friends). I have old man memory, but back in 21/5 era, IIRC Vicky would spot me 9 or 10 points. As I got better, the handicap went down to 5. Vicky also did multiball with me many a time. Her coach was Rey Domingo, a 2400 SH. She asked Rey to hit with me from time to time and he was a steady lobber. I credit him the most with my FH smashes.
There were many PH in The Firehouse, probably 2nd best after Alex Tam was Steven Mok. Slowly saw he improve from 1900 to ~2400! Steven started off short pips and changed to inverted and was a great looper. Watching Steven play Alex or play Rey was the best! Too bad video camers and VCR's were so expensive back then. No smartphones to record the matches. Boy, technology improved so much! Anyway, back to the PH in The Firehouse, Fu Lap Lee was probably 3rd best PH. He was an inverted player and was a great looper too, about 2000-2200, maybe 2300? Richard Ling played SH with me, but Alex started him off PH. Richard was easily 2000 and at least 2200.
Although I had 'informal formal training', it was not as good as 'formal formal training', if you know what i mean. Back then, i probably at best was 1600, but didn't play that many tournaments and peaked at 1350 or so. The Firehouse had Friday Night League and that is probably where I got a lot of experience from outside of practicing with my friends. We were all young and played games mostly for bragging rights instead of practicing hard.
Took a 32 yrs break, and I didn't remember about that dept of parks recreation center i played in as a kid. Somehow a friend mentioned it and I checked it out and it still had table tennis! So i joined, been playing about 4 yrs since my 32 yrs break with 3 of it at that rec center. That rec center has many Chinese seniors as senior membership is only $25/year! And many of the seniors play PH, but they didn't really practice, they just played games and got to a certain level.
I have a general idea what is proper technique, but the lack of serious practice has kept me at a certain level. And to make things challenging, this year I seriously tried to learn RPB mostly on my own and give up on TPB for this year. It took me some time to get used to the weight of 2 rubbers first. Then learning RPB block, then punch and flat hit. Have some idea of RPB spinning but haven't seriously added that to my repertoire yet. Trying to get the timing on the block and punch. Because of my concentration on RPB, I seem to choke on my FH loop during gameplay. During practice I seem to be ok.
To improve, I post videos to this forum and my friend 42andbackpains has been a great help as well as he received real/official coaching private lessons and has pinpointed some of my flaws. As a matter of fact, I got together with him last night and we hit/played about 2 hours. Will post video of the match, however, I am rusty after having not played 3 weeks. I'm the type that if I don't play in 3 days or so, I lose a lot of my timing/touch/game. 42andbackpains though, with hurt back didn't play in 6 months.
I generally know my flaws and using visualization and self-talk as well as practice, I do my best to correct them. But as a kid, not having formal training hurt my game. I just keep at it to try to improve.
On French TT forums we tend to share videos and opininons from time to time (like we do here), and I try to look for videos on youtube but of course, most of them are in mandarin or korean or japanese and most of the time with no subs... so that's not such an easy task.
So I'm curious if you have any tips or resources worth sharing or anything that could help the PH community ;-)
I don't watch that many videos believe it or not. I refer to Wang Hao's video and watch and rewatch that from time to time. I generally focus on playing/hitting more than watching videos. Will leave it to others to post resources.
My general tip is to relax. Easy for me to say, and hard for me to do at times.
