Forehand loop internal shoulder rotation

[Dominikk85]

Hi guys, I'm dominik and Im new here. I'm a rec player but I used to play tennis competently. I have a question regarding the forehand loop. In tennis there is research showing that internal shoulder rotation is one of the main contributors of racket speed.
(like in this excercise)



The players will externally rotate the arm as they start the swing and then shoot the forearm around the upper arm by internally rotation the humerus. This is a very fast movement.

In table tennis however it looks like you swing more of the whole arm upwards and forward. I think boll uses a bit of that internal rotation where the elbow comes forward a little before the hand and then reverses


but the chinese players don't seem to do that and swing more the whole arm with the elbow away from the body.

What are the reasons for doing it like that instead using the strong internal shoulder rotators?

[Brs]

Leverage.

[anchorschmidt]

It has changed in recent years. Ma Long and Fan Zhendong use different techniques (somewhat of a mix) compared to say Ma Lin who mostly used the straight arm technique.


I think it has a lot of do with the equipment that they use. I've used a tacky rubber on the forehand for a while and I naturally had to play with a straighter arm to use the rubber.

[Ilia Minkin]

I think it is because in table tennis most people try to generate topspin, so there is a lot of vertical movement to hit the ball tangetially. While in tennis it is more horizontal and flat. If you look at flat hit strokes in table tennis, you proably will see more of internal rotation and strokes similar to tennis. For example, look at Mattias Karlsson's forehand, or Shan Xiaona's.

[Ilia Minkin]

E.g. look at the forehand played at 2:09

[Boogar]

I agree with Ilia. There are instances where the shoulder rotation is used. For example for flat hits, mostly seen from short pip players or for counter top spinning loaded balls, where you can go over the ball with a closed racket. (close to the table that is)

[UpSideDownCarl]

From a mechanics standpoint, part of why there is less shoulder rotation in table tennis has to do with the fact that the followthrough in table tennis stops at about the midline of the body and the followthrough in tennis goes all the way across the body.

In tennis the reset is not as critical because the player has plenty of time to reset. In table tennis, the opponent can be as close as 9 feet away so the reset is very important which means the stroke needs not to go too far past the midline of the body on followthrough or the reset cannot be fast enough.

For you to get the racket speed and still complete the stroke at the midline, the mechanics of the stroke has to be different and the closing of the angle of the elbow is more important to racket speed. And you can't use quite as much internal rotation of the shoulder as a result of the point of the followthrough.

[Der_Echte]

Go ahead and rotate internally all one wants. You might have fun. One might also try to keep hitting with max power and little skill using those kind of mechanics and enjoy a rotator cuff tear.

Do what you can afford to do I always say...

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[Archosaurus]

Seeing as I injured myself due to this kind of motion, I've largely went towards a very straight forearm snap. No arm or shoulder injuries or even soreness since.

I'd listen to @Der_Echte

[NextLevel]

There is shoulder rotation, it is subtle, and it is not used for power - just for extra racket head acceleration for shaping the ball and producing spin. But there are other larger body parts for creating similar effects, that is why you see table tennis players contorting their abs to cover the ball. The key is that you have to move your shoulder towards the ball rather than leaving your shoulder in a static position.

[dominus7]

Go ahead and rotate internally all one wants. You might have fun. One might also try to keep hitting with max power and little skill using those kind of mechanics and enjoy a rotator cuff tear.

Do what you can afford to do I always say...

Sent from my SM-N920V using Tapatalk

Can you send a footage about that straight rotation?

[ttmonster]

Uh - oh !

Can you send a footage about that straight rotation?

[Der_Echte]

Straight rotation may be a linguistic no-no. I do not really think about rotating my rotator cuff. I only think of waiting for the ball, getting down, opening up, and exploding upwards and forward independently loose and firming up grip at impact to make max power transfer to ball.

I really don't think about any of it except to stay loose and wait a little longer. My vision sees opponent nd my mind tells me when to strike.

A vid of me demonstrating this will be like 1/3 of a puzzle, only enough to get you into trouble. You would need a lot of other explanations to connect it all together.

The only online vids I know besides Aussie based TT Edge are the Kim Jung Hoon vid series and you gotta study Korean a powerful long time to know what the heck he is saying.

[Dominikk85]

I think it is because in table tennis most people try to generate topspin, so there is a lot of vertical movement to hit the ball tangetially. While in tennis it is more horizontal and flat. If you look at flat hit strokes in table tennis, you proably will see more of internal rotation and strokes similar to tennis. For example, look at Mattias Karlsson's forehand, or Shan Xiaona's.

That makes sense. Tennis topspin forehands also were more low to high 30 years ago but now they are using more of a flat arm path and a windshield wiper brushing of the racket by pronation of the arm with a more angled grip to create the spin.



I can see why that would not work in table tennis as the racket is much shorter and thus you don't get as much upward leverage from turning the hand inwards.

[UpSideDownCarl]

That makes sense. Tennis topspin forehands also were more low to high 30 years ago but now they are using more of a flat arm path and a windshield wiper brushing of the racket by pronation of the arm with a more angled grip to create the spin.



I can see why that would not work in table tennis as the racket is much shorter and thus you don't get as much upward leverage from turning the hand inwards.

Your video shows the issue perfectly. The tennis followthrough has the right elbow go pretty much all the way to the left shoulder so the racket raps around the body, past the left shoulder and behind. And below the head. Whereas, the table tennis forehand stops at about the eyebrow a little above the eyes and, ideally, at the mid-line of the head.

This video has the information on the followthrough of a TT stroke. At about 1:40 Alois explains the FH followthrough and then does a pretty good imitation of the tennis followthrough and explains that that is not what you want for TT.

The finishing point of the stroke in TT is what it is because of both topspin generation and reset. To reset fast enough, the stroke needs to finish before it crosses the midline. To generate topspin, you need to followthrough higher. Whereas, the footage of forehands from the tennis video shows FH strokes that go straight across the body at a fairly flat trajectory. You don't brush loop in tennis even though you do spin the ball. In table tennis you do much less driving than spinning. Reverse that formula for tennis.

And because of the followthrough and how, to achieve that followthrough you need to have your shoulder more stable, the bend at the elbow, in table tennis replaces some of the function of the internal rotation of the shoulder in a tennis stroke for that acceleration and power.

And what I am saying here is really not any different than what I said in the first post I made. Swinging across your body the way the tennis players do, or the way Alois imitates as what you DO NOT want, would result in less topspin and a slow reset. And you would be watching the ball go past you as your shot was returned and you were not ready for the next shot.

The last detail to understand is that with a tennis ball, and the distance you are hitting it, the stroke requires a considerable amount more force than in table tennis where the ball is very light, you are putting more of your power into spinning the ball, and the ball does not have to go very far. So in table tennis, precision, timing, acceleration and total racket speed as you brush into the ball are more important than all out force behind the ball. Otherwise the table tennis stroke finishing at the midline would not work as well as it does.

But you can still see top players, when they are trying to add extra force to finish a point, add extra internal rotation to the shoulder and finish further across the body. And this also gets a lot of amateurs confused thinking that is better form then when you stop at the midline.

[UpSideDownCarl]

By the way, I don't think the internal rotation of a tennis stroke is bad for your shoulder. Otherwise tennis players would be injuring themselves all the time. But in TT the strokes are too fast and too close together so doing it over and over at such short intervals would put a lot more stress on your shoulder than what happens in TT.

BTW: Der_Echte can play. His strokes are good. They wouldn't look that different than what they are showing in the ping skills video.

[Archosaurus]

By the way, I don't think the internal rotation of a tennis stroke is bad for your shoulder. Otherwise tennis players would be injuring themselves all the time. But in TT the strokes are too fast and too close together so doing it over and over at such short intervals would put a lot more stress on your shoulder than what happens in TT.

BTW: Der_Echte can play. His strokes are good. They wouldn't look that different than what they are showing in the ping skills video.

It doesn't put a lot of stress on the shoulder if done properly. I have firsthand experience with improper technique, and you can end up doing some strange things with your arm and back if you don't know what you're doing. I wouldn't advise anyone to try to actively perform those kinds of movements without any kind of training and reasoning behind it.

[UpSideDownCarl]

It doesn't put a lot of stress on the shoulder if done properly. I have firsthand experience with improper technique, and you can end up doing some strange things with your arm and back if you don't know what you're doing. I wouldn't advise anyone to try to actively perform those kinds of movements without any kind of training and reasoning behind it.

Since we have no footage of what you did to injure yourself, I will not comment on it. But what those tennis players are doing does not hurt them. And the movement itself is not bad for you. But perhaps you cannot do the movement as frequently in the space of a short period of time as table tennis would require.

[Archosaurus]

Since we have no footage of what you did to injure yourself, I will not comment on it. But what those tennis players are doing does not hurt them. And the movement itself is not bad for you. But perhaps you cannot do the movement as frequently in the space of a short period of time as table tennis would require.

I wasn't doing that exactly, but I had this "idea" of rotation of the arm that was similar, and I think you can guess the rest. I think if people know what they are doing exactly, well, they know what they are doing exactly.

[Der_Echte]

Maybe I am visualizing a different meaning.

The shoulder rotation I do is both shoulders turn horizontal.

There is also an independent movement of my hitting shoulder if I stay loose.

The only internal rotation I have is on a BH shot... Mostly on the follow through of a banana flip or a longer stroker using more wrist.

When i tore my rotator cuff when I was mostly out of tt, I could not do any of those BH shots for months until I healed to 60%...

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