Is muscle the most important?

Well, they do have muscles..
But what's way more important in table tennis is speed, tactics, technique and (Chinese!) mentality.

Head Coach Liu even said that the Europeans had better natural body to play
But I know that he is emphasizing on technique when he said that

Well fatcat, it is true what you said..to an extend. Having muscles in the right area and exploiting them in your shots is the key. Timing and technique comes first. I play a lot of tennis and badminton too, and it seems that the 'skinnier' players with good technique and footwork excel in these racquets sports. same goes with TT.

In badminton, the Danes produce some of the finest players in the world. Tall and muscular but their smashes are surprisingly average in professional standards, in the range of 250-275 kmh. But the Chinese and Malaysian players tops them all with an average speed of 290-300kmh.
In tennis Nadal has the biggest forearm I have ever seen, but his serve is very ordinary in terms of speed. Instead the tall lanky Croat Ivo Karlovic tops the chart at 156mph or 251kmh.

In these cases, I think technique plays a way greater importance than muscles.

azlan said:

In these cases, I think technique plays a way greater importance than muscles.

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Without question this is the case with TT as well. A good stroke is important. But how you contact the ball and where on the blade face you contact the ball are huge factors.

I have played guys who have lots of muscles, who are huge, the big bulky muscles slowed them down and they had no chance against me. I have played pro tennis players who thought they were really good at table tennis but, because they did not have the technique to deal with spin and they were hitting the ball the way you would in tennis, they had no chance. Someone trying to drive a ball against a loop has no chance.

Technique, technique technique.

I personally think that, what distinguishes table tennis from other sports is the amount of subtle detail oriented technique it requires. The precision of the contact. The ability to deal and deal with different kinds of spin. This is a subtle sport. You need power but you need amazing amounts of control. As we play for longer we forget how much detail we put into how we contact the ball and how precise the footwork needs to be to get us into position for the right strokes. Reflexes, speed, agility. Not big muscles but strong fast ones. But they are not as important as technique. I cannot tell you how many times I have played someone who seemed old and out of shape who was really good, and how many times I have played someone who seemed like they were in great shape who did not have the technique.

@ Carl - I just have to say that Wang Liqin is not your average someone and he drives the ball against loops always. But you're absolutely right about the bigger muscular guys lacking a lot of agility needed for the table.

@fatcat - You have to understand the science of the sport to really understand why the smaller players from China are still winning against the bigger players of Europe. First and foremost the Chinese players are less muscular, but proportionally produce more energy than the European players. Primarily because they have more dense muscles they're able to produce the agility and strength needed for these faster shots. Just because a person has larger muscles does not mean they are stronger. The prime example is Bruce Lee. He was 135-150 lbs depending on his training regimen and was able to bench press 300 lbs over twice his weight. There were many people with larger muscles in his schools that could not bench that same amount, but their muscles were larger. Kareem Abdul Jabar comes to mind for someone being vastly larger, but not as strong.

Second the Chinese technique is scientifically more sound than the European technique which means that even if a European player can produce more energy from his muscles he is not able to transfer the equal amount of energy into the ball with his technique. While the Chinese technique may be the same case as far as transference of energy they do have a much higher percentage that transfers into the ball. I would venture to guess that the top European players produce a certain amount of energy say 100 lbs of force from their muscles, with the European technique they are able to transfer maybe 50 percent of that energy into the ball being around 50 lbs of force. So even if the European players were stronger and say the Chinese could only transfer maybe 80 lbs of force, their percentage is likely around 90 percent of transference and that would be 72 lbs of force.

I'm not too entirely sure that lbs of force is the correct term to use for measuring transference of energy, but you get what I mean. Their technique is all about pushing the ball with their weight and shoulders where as the European technique is about Pulling the ball with their forearm, wrist, and body. It's just not as efficient as the Chinese method of looping or driving.

@ Richard, you are right on all counts here. I was not talking about a player who knows how to drive or counter a loop. I was talking about a tennis player who has a good tennis stroke and cannot even read how much spin is on the ball and so, does not know how to counter the amount of spin when driving, how to contact the ball, how much to close the racket for contact. A table tennis player can drive a loop but you have to know how to do it. That was part of the point, technique, technique technique. So, I am agreeing with you. And it is a good point you make about how a table tennis player can do things that a tennis player cannot do in Table Tennis unless he really knows how to play table tennis too. And I have played tennis players who really do play Table Tennis also who are very good players and I don't have a chance against them. And it is different when they flat hit loops. Scary.

By the way, on more bit on the Chinese technique, which Richard is absolutely right about. If you look at the European third ball attacks, they use soft, slow, touch loops to turn the spin over a large percentage of the time and it looks like they are looking to lengthen the rallies and find a spot to take the point. The Chinese players third ball attacks are mostly ripped, full speed, as much or more spin but 3 to 5 times more speed. They are trying to end the point as soon as possible. This goes with what Mr. RicharD said about them transferring more of their potential energy into the ball. And when you learn how to just rip everything you are learning how to harness more of your potential power.

So, nice post Mr. RicharD.

fatcat, what we are saying, though muscles are important, it is not the most important thing in TT. But, it helps once you get all your technique spot on

The most important thing is the technique! of course, you need some muscles for footwork, to hold your racket and to turn your body ^^
But if you got the technique and by playing the same stroke over and over, you'll get faster and your strokes become more and more powerful!
The technique is the most important but there should be a little bit of muscles too ;D

technique is most important

I think Technique and mental is the most important.

azlan said:

Well fatcat, it is true what you said..to an extend. Having muscles in the right area and exploiting them in your shots is the key. Timing and technique comes first. I play a lot of tennis and badminton too, and it seems that the 'skinnier' players with good technique and footwork excel in these racquets sports. same goes with TT.

In badminton, the Danes produce some of the finest players in the world. Tall and muscular but their smashes are surprisingly average in professional standards, in the range of 250-275 kmh. But the Chinese and Malaysian players tops them all with an average speed of 290-300kmh.
In tennis Nadal has the biggest forearm I have ever seen, but his serve is very ordinary in terms of speed. Instead the tall lanky Croat Ivo Karlovic tops the chart at 156mph or 251kmh.

In these cases, I think technique plays a way greater importance than muscles.

Click to expand...

About that Karlovic.. He is like 2 metres tall, so he can get a more direct angle on the opponents side. For others it requires more spin and accuracy to get a fast serve in that square area I read that some of his opponents said that it is like he is serving from out of a tree lol.

But I agree, technique is most important, muscles are good to support the technique. or you can look at it like this: When you are strong, you need to put less effort into a shot to make it a good shot. And with less effort, you can get better accuracy. So that is where muscles really help, to enable you to accurately execute your technique without losing too much speed on the ball. And it is of course easier to recover to a 'neutral position' when your body is stronger.

No point having the size and the muscle if you're not agile and don't have the right techinque.
Here are a few examples:Waldner's opponents were all young and tall but still got put down but his great technique and vast experience.

So yeah technique determine the effectiveness of your power output.
Full power with poor technique won nothing compared to medium power released with fine technique.

Look @ Wang Liqin's loop and Jun Mizutani's loop as an example.


I am not criticizing Jun since his euro loop is one of the finest. I am just saying that different technique bear different result.
The Jap faced hard time against Joo because of his low torque loop during the 2011 WC.

Bryce said:

No point having the size and the muscle if you're not agile and don't have the right techinque.
Here are a few examples:

Waldner's opponents were all young and tall but still got put down but his great technique and vast experience.

Click to expand...

You're right... Waldner is getting kinda big stomach now, but still he's kickin' ass!

Waldner wins most of his matches due to tactics and service. Many players just don't have the same service as he does and he is able to third ball attack pretty easily. If you watch his ratio of service versus their ratio of service he tends to finish the points as soon as possible because of his advantage in service, but they on the other hand must rally with him in order to keep the point.

Anders said:

You're right... Waldner is getting kinda big stomach now, but still he's kickin' ass!

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exactly ;D he managed to win by technique and tactics just by playing the ball on the table until the other made a mistake. while the other one forced and forced to play harder and harder and make soon or later the mistake.

Mr. RicharD said:

Waldner wins most of his matches due to tactics and service. Many players just don't have the same service as he does and he is able to third ball attack pretty easily. If you watch his ratio of service versus their ratio of service he tends to finish the points as soon as possible because of his advantage in service, but they on the other hand must rally with him in order to keep the point.

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Yes, you're right! He has good serves and knows exactly what to do when he serves. the other one just made serves and tried to attack him down, which was not so successful

So, people, the best thing to win a game, is to play as long as possible on the table and wait for a good opening to make the point ;D