Wow funny how everyone misreads into my posts. Okay here's the definition of skill:
1. ability to do something well: the ability to do something well, usually gained through training or experience
2. something requiring training to do well: something that requires training and experience to do well, e.g. an art or trade
I've played with pips. I've played short and long pips and have beaten players who use inverted at the 2200+ rating in the U.S. I'm currently at 1061 or something to that nature, but I beat 1800+ players with my inverted setup.
Twiddling doesn't take skill because my students at there first day of training were able to do it even before I showed them how to hold a paddle shakehand. So I don't know what you're saying there. They do it involuntarily so I don't see how it can be said that it's a technique that requires skill because according to the definition they have not trained to do it they were just naturally able to do it. And no my students have never played a day of Table Tennis before I started teach them because they had never been opened to it.
Well, the twiddling action in itself is quite easy, but twiddling in a match situation using two different rubbers is something else: it is a skill. First your twiddling action needs to be quick enough, you need to take in account the technique required to use both rubbers on both sides and you need to remember which rubber is on which side (you're twiddling more than once during a rally) and all this
during one rally. This probably all seems easy when using inverted on both sides, because their characteristics are more alike, but when using two totally different rubbers: not easy.
I don't know exactly where Lorre is getting at. The whole point about my post had he read the full thread was that people like to complain about pips. I live in Lancaster, PA where we are a predominantly Long Pips area. Everyone here plays with pips either short or Long and they're all rated above the 2000 mark. I'm only rated at 1061 because I had a bad tournament against some players I've never played against from Maryland who had some very unique styles. I'll hope to attend a tournament shortly here and maybe my rating will go up. Come down to any of our Lancaster clubs if you're in the area I'd love to play any of you.
I've had about a dozen players from Penn State who switched to pips because of the clear advantage it gave them. They need only know how to hit off the bounce or chop block and they're able to beat many players at the clubs around our area.
If you read the final sentence of my post, you'll see where I'm getting at and you'll see I respond quite directly to the whole point you're trying make in your posts.
My other remarks on the content of your posts is just to let you see how wrong some of your opinions are. What I find strange is not that you have (wrong) opinions about pips, but that you don't change your opinion when someone who is experienced with pips corrects you (i.e. me or some of the other 80-90% pip players in the area). It's like saying when you have a cold: it is caused by a virus, but when you consult your doctor he says it is caused by a bacteria. You don't believe him and still state it is caused by a virus. Now, who's probably right? You or the one who has studied as a doctor for many years? I'm not stating I studied for playing pips
, but I'm experienced with using them andknow what I'm talking about (off course not at a fully detailed level of a Joo or a Chen).
On the topic of athleticism. Do you think that Joo Se Hyuk or Chen Weixing run less than the Inverted players they play against throughout the match?
To everything that Lorre said about deception and athleticism vs technique and skill you're subjectively stating that in one instance this happens and that happens, but to an overall match for hit for hit the stats don't lie. Joo runs more and uses the pips more in his hits. The inverted players that beat them run less and loop more.
It's not because player A runs 10km and player B runs 5km, that one of the two isn't athletic: both are. Your stats are correct and they only indicate that player A is more athletic than player B, but not that player A is athletic and player B is not.
And finally I'd like to end with your personal experiences. How many players have you coached and opened to the Table Tennis world? How many have quit because they played some pips players who did not to coach them on what to do to beat them. How many tournaments have you gone to where there aren't players who are upset by someone using a deceptive rubber.
I'm not a trainer because I'm frankly too young to this is in a good way (I'm still learning myself and that takes a lot of training time), but I train quite often against the (little) kids. If they are newbies, I just use my inverted to let them appreciate the sport. If they are already more advanced, I use my pips and see what they do right and what they do wrong. If they are interested (some are), I'll correct them.
I never have someone quit the sport due to my pips and many young players are interested in how I play (i.e. modern defense).
ATM I play in a atmosphere that is against pips. They say people using pips are cheaters or that they don't get beyond a certain level. This is also told to the kids. Some of them, including me, get an insult once and a while. This is told in presence of the kids. Now imagine how it feels for such a kid seeing the player who's constantly rising in level, who's always prepared to train with them and who's a training beast, using pips. Some will feel attracted to pips (so in a way pip haters create pip users
), others will dislike it. But both group aren't getting the correct incentive: they are attracted or repulsed by the fact that I'm still rising (an emotional argument), while the decision of using pips must be made rational (is this person suitable for using pips?).
I regularly visit tournaments and when I was in the lower grades, there was really hatred against pips. One reason only: they don't understand what pips do and are helpless when playing against them. Now I'm in the middle and higher levels, most of this hatred disappeared. One reason only: the players understand what a pip does and when defeated, they are defeated by a better player, not his material.
I'll go first:
I started playing Table Tennis in 2003. Never heard about the sport and had never seen it being played properly until the week after I first encountered it. Once I saw I was hooked. At the time we had 10 members in our club with 3 rated players at the 1300+ rating level our best player was around 1600.
In 2004 I became the president and grew the club to 35 weekly members playing several days a week and using our rating system based off a starting rating of 1000.
Took a couple years off from school and it became inactive until 2007 when I started it back up again this time growing it to 65 weekly members playing in our rated matches and also playing against 3 other schools in the area. It wasn't until 2008 when we started attending better clubs that players started learning about pips. We had 3-4 players switch to the frictionless pips at the time and they were beating everyone at which point the following semester we had all but 15-20 players continuing to play in our rated matches and playing against the 3 other schools.
I went on to University Park where I was coached under Hank McCoulum and learned quite a lot from the team and club in general. That's when I really started studying about the science of the sport. Finally I went on to create my own club at the beginning of this year where we're currently at about 12 regulars each week and have had about 12-16 coming to our monthly amateur tournaments.
Now I don't know what your personal experiences are, but each and every time I introduce players to a club that predominantly uses pips and the atmosphere doesn't allow them to learn properly how to beat them they quit. There's no room for growth. I believe that players should learn how to play against pips players because I personally have learned how to beat pips players, but to say that it doesn't stagnate the growth of the sport is pretty naive.
If you hear about people complaining about pips then that in itself produces a negative connotation towards the sport hence creating poor growth.
Being a president of a club after one year and beating 1800 inverted players and 2200+ inverted players when using non-inverted rubbers while just being above 1000? Then there's really (1) something wrong with the rating system you're playing in, (2) you're a huge underrated player and very capable person or (3) there are only average players in your area and thereby all are able to beat all.
In your personal experiences it stagnates the sport, but isn't that a part your own fault? If I have to believe what you say (what I unevitably do), you're able to beat pip players, but you don't learn your own or other youngsters how to beat them? No, you have to create more hatred by creating an own only inverted league, because that's what you'll be doing: creating more hatred towards each other. And you don't help the youngsters either, because they don't learn how to play pips in that only inverted league.
Why not create a school designed to learn how to play against non-inverted players? Both youngsters and non-inverted players in one place, understanding each other, learning from each other and getting to appreciate each other. The once 80%-90% pip players in the area will significantly go down and only the good pip users will survive. Problem solved!
In Europe look at the pips players there. Do any of them improve their technique because they'd like to have the success that Joo has had? Personally I'd say no. Just watch the ETTC womans matches and you can clearly see how low the level of pips players is, but yet they're still able to compete at the level of some of the top Euro women.
I live in Europe and I'm improving my technique...
Did you ever see someone like Ivancan or Pavlovich competing? They are European, you know.
Why wouldn't their level be at the top of the Euro women?
BTW, now you're stating pip players can improve their technique. So now pips players do have technique?
Again I have never said that people shouldn't have the right to use pips. On the contrary I don't believe anything should be banned because it just makes players angrier. Personally I believe that pips may require a different technique and even a different set of skills but I don't believe it requires more skill and technique than that of the aggressive inverted players say in the top 20 rankings.
Now pip players have technique and skill? Strange, reading your other posts. I never stated we have more or less technique and skill than an inverted player: we both have different techniques and skills that are equal in value.
The reason being all you'd have to do is watch the Joo vs Chen matches and they never loop each others pips balls they hit with their own pips. I don't mean to offend anyone by this post, but I just want to point out that pips are considered by the majority of players out there as a negative out look on the sport. And until people stop complaining about them they'll never be anything but negative to the sport.
So if everyone pays taxes to their local governments and if I'm not mistaken, most of the people complain about those taxes, then they are negative for the society? Maybe the players who complain about pips, should learn how to deal with them by going to your school. Then the negative effect you mention also will disappear. You will bring the two groups closer together by making them understand each other.
Inverted can do everything that the pips can do, but you just have to learn how to use them. So for everything you're saying about how I have to learn how to beat pips players with inverted why can't I say the same thing to the pips players? Why can't they learn how to play inverted and beat players who use pips?
It's true that inverted can do what pips can do, but it is nearly impossible for human beings to do it with the current speed and spin (e.g. creating a no-spin ball).
You're saying you're able to beat pip players: if I'm not mistaken, I never told you to learn how to beat pip players with inverted. I only made it clear a lot of your opinions about pips are incorrect.
You can't say that to them because they've chosen
freely to use pips. You've chosen
freely inverted as your basic setup and you're the one complaining about pip players. We pip players say: deal with it, whatever your problem is you're experiencing with pip players (in your case: they are negative to the sport because they don't want inverted players to learn how to beat them - they just want to win). I present you another solution for your problem, which is in part a real problem. Open a bounding school instead of a seperating league. Your opinions about pips are, however, totally incorrect. Ask someone who's willing to teach you something about pips and who's experienced in using them for advise and listen to what he/she says.
