Switching soft rubber to hard ones

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I uses soft rubbers both bh, fh. I use ready-made racket and i want to develop my racket. I have good technique which is wide arch topspins, loops. The ball goes off table when i do wide topspins. Therefore, i want to change my rubber hardness to harder ones to keep the ball on table. What are differences i will notice? Is it okay to jump to harder ones from soft? How long will i adapt?
 
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The difference is not huge if you have the right level for it. I remember switching from rakza 7 soft to rakza 7 and at the time it was way too fast for me and bad for my game.

A year or two later i tried it again and it was very OK. Now i forgot a bit what a soft rubber feel like but the difference is less important than what i expected

But for your case, it's maybe not due to the rubber that you have this problem ? And it's probable that the harder rubber will be a bit harder to control so i won't help i think. I you have an overall good feeling with rubber, maybe you just need to train a bit
 
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I uses soft rubbers both bh, fh. I use ready-made racket and i want to develop my racket. I have good technique which is wide arch topspins, loops. The ball goes off table when i do wide topspins. Therefore, i want to change my rubber hardness to harder ones to keep the ball on table. What are differences i will notice? Is it okay to jump to harder ones from soft? How long will i adapt?

I guess depending on how hard you gonna go with you change, the only thing you will notice is that you need to change your technique and maybe hit harder.

I mean that change is no big deal and not expensive to experience. Just buy smth like big dipper or a training rubber from 729 and see if your shots all of a sudden hit the table.

The overall problem is, that nobody here can say smth to solve your problen. We dont know your technique and we dont know your current Equipment. Thats why nobody will be able to give you a decent advice futhermore.
 
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Thanks. Most of developed players have been saying i have to improve my equipment and develop to higher level. Im gonna change to blade Clipper Cr Wrb wood, FH Xiom Vega Pro (close to Tenergy 05), BH Xiom vega Europe.
 
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1) Yeah, it would be hard to say what is going on without seeing footage of you playing.

2) If you are trying to make it so more balls land on the table, harder rubbers usually make that harder. To use harder rubbers you need to have more precise technique. So if you are hitting the ball off the table with softer rubbers, harder rubbers may make that issue worse rather than better.

3) If you are using a pre-built racket, maybe the first step would be to get an allround blade and rubbers that are good quality and not a pre-built racket. Something like and Appelgren Allplay with Vega Pro rubbers might be a good start. But that is hard to say without seeing you play.
 
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1) Yeah, it would be hard to say what is going on without seeing footage of you playing.

2) If you are trying to make it so more balls land on the table, harder rubbers usually make that harder. To use harder rubbers you need to have more precise technique. So if you are hitting the ball off the table with softer rubbers, harder rubbers may make that issue worse rather than better.

3) If you are using a pre-built racket, maybe the first step would be to get an allround blade and rubbers that are good quality and not a pre-built racket. Something like and Appelgren Allplay with Vega Pro rubbers might be a good start. But that is hard to say without seeing you play.

Sorry, not like off the table. When i topspins, it usually okay. But in rallies, counter topspin or topspin with nice acceleration leads to ball go more than on the table and it go off. That s why maybe i should choose harder. I always use my hips and whole body to rotate and accelerate like chinese techniques when i topspins and loops
 
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Sorry, not like off the table. When i topspins, it usually okay. But in rallies, counter topspin or topspin with nice acceleration leads to ball go more than on the table and it go off. That s why maybe i should choose harder. I always use my hips and whole body to rotate and accelerate like chinese techniques when i topspins and loops

I am not sure I am understanding you. This sounds like you are saying that when you counterloop, your shots go long. Is that what you are saying or did you mean something else? And if you are saying that, or anything else about having trouble controlling your shots and where the ball lands, then harder rubbers will make it harder for you to control.

But the only way we could actually know what you are talking about is if you show footage of you playing. It would be worth showing footage of you playing.
 
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Mongolia has a high elevation, just like Denver in the US. The ball will curve less in the air, so going harder could make it worse.
 
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Mongolia has a high elevation, just like Denver in the US. The ball will curve less in the air, so going harder could make it worse.
lol, all people of one country aren't same. Its how the person studied technique
 
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It’s very difficult to just text. The most important thing in 1st-2nd year players is the contact and timing that you cannot describe by text. So it’s sensible to ask for video. (Well. I’m making this up :cool: but that’s what I see from myself and other trainees in my club)

Generally speaking you prefer hard rubber if you want faster but still spinnier loop (thick brush) (when you feel like if you go very fast you don’t get more spin even though you are brushing. It’s different from pure speed - more smashy stroke) but you sacrifice the slow loop (thin brush) a bit. I do think it’s more a personal taste than your ability.

A clipper, all wood is good. You really don’t need a too slow, all-round blade. Some chaps like Carl may prefer all-round to start because they are very fit so when they started they had the tendency to hit too hard (I see this all the time in very fit players) then get softer when they develop. If you are skinny (like me) then it’s a little less a problem (still a problem :cool:).
 
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It’s very difficult to just text. The most important thing in 1st-2nd year players is the contact and timing that you cannot describe by text. So it’s sensible to ask for video. (Well. I’m making this up :cool: but that’s what I see from myself and other trainees in my club)

Generally speaking you prefer hard rubber if you want faster but still spinnier loop (thick brush) (when you feel like if you go very fast you don’t get more spin even though you are brushing. It’s different from pure speed - more smashy stroke) but you sacrifice the slow loop (thin brush) a bit. I do think it’s more a personal taste than your ability.

A clipper, all wood is good. You really don’t need a too slow, all-round blade. Some chaps like Carl may prefer all-round to start because they are very fit so when they started they had the tendency to hit too hard (I see this all the time in very fit players) then get softer when they develop. If you are skinny (like me) then it’s a little less a problem (still a problem :cool:).

If he is using a prebuilt racket, something in an All, All+ or Off- range would be sensible. When a blade is too fast the effect is to cause the person to cut down their stroke and take a weaker stroke just to land the ball on the table. A slightly slower blade causes you to have to learn to put more power into your stroke which, in the long run is more likely to get you to end up with a higher quality stroke and higher quality mechanics. The people who would most benefit from the slower blade are people with stroke mechanics that need a little work, or people who are not as strong because the slower blade will, in the long run, cause you to work a little harder to achieve that power.

This has the added benefit of helping you learn to time legs, hips, core rotation, forearm snap and wrist with the contact of the ball so that the stroke mechanics are efficient. In a good stroke you actually don't really have to work too hard because the ball is very light. You just need to have the force you use well timed so that you are translating power into the ball on contact. This is why a short BH stroke off the bounce (like a BH Flick) can end up having so much power. What matters is timing force used with ball contact so the power you use is efficient and you are not wasting power: so the force from your stroke transfers into the ball on contact.

This works on your mechanics on a neural level. Your body figures things out without you realizing it. Slower blade will force you to learn to be more efficient. Faster blade will make you think you are efficient enough, which is fine when your technique is already very good. But not what you want when your technique is still developing. So, if what we know is:

1) OP is using a prebuilt racket (possibly with rubbers that don't really grip the ball--think of the rubbers on so many prebuilt rackets, especially ones that have been used for a long time already),
2) He tends to overshoot when counterlooping (relooping an opponent's loop),

Then a kind of fast blade like a Clipper, and hard, fast rubbers, could be exactly the opposite of what the OP needs.

Without video, we cannot tell. I can't tell you how many people have PMed me over the years describing their game and asking about equipment and when I saw footage, their play and their description of their play was so divergent that it was clearly worth recommending equipment more cautiously.

Without footage, all I would say is a mid range blade that gives good control and mid range rubbers that allow a player to do all shots is worth starting off with as a first racket where you buy the blade and rubbers separately.

If you have a coach you work with, maybe the coach can tell you equipment that would be useful for you. If you play at a club borrowing a lot of different rackets from club mates and seeing how different things feel and work for you is worth doing. During CoVID that is not so easy to do.

But, in my years of seeing video after hearing play style described, I have only once seen someone have an accurate assessment of their play while actually asking for equipment recommendations. And almost always, people seem to overestimate their abilities in that scenario. And it is very very often the case that lower and mid-level players seem to use equipment that is faster than what would be optimal for them. And that usually tends to slow their development of higher level technique.

So, yeah, from years of experience, I recommend equipment cautiously.

If I told you I needed a pair of shoes and asked you, over the internet, "what size shoes should I get?" how would you answer me? That is really much more akin to someone asking what equipment they should use or if new harder rubbers will help fix an issue that is likely an issue of technique than most people realize. If we cannot see the issue, we cannot tell what equipment will be useful for the person or what will fix the issue that causes the ball to go long.

But in the end, everyone has a right to choose their own equipment even if what they choose would be suboptimal for their development.
 
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Couldn’t be more convincing! I wish I could explain to my training partners this well! (I bet I had the luck that I was adviced by professionals/coaches so It was more straightforward for me to just take those)
 
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Commenting on equipment on the web without video is challenging enough at sea-level.

At high altitude, shots travel faster and farther as they slow down less in thinner air. Even though the spin dissipates less as well, that also means less drag and thus Magnus effect acting on the ball, so players have to spin harder to make their shots come down than those playing at sea level. As a result, shots have a stronger kick when they land.

Now, harder rubbers tend to throw higher and farther within the range of velocity and rotation typical for a topspin game at sea-level. Guess where this story is heading next?

A study on the obstacles in the development of table tennis in Yunnan, with an average elevation even higher than that of Mongolia and Denver writes:

  2.高原训练乒乓球项目存在的问题
  居住高原的乒乓球运动员由于世代居住或长期生活在低氧环境,其生理机能、某些组织结构及生化代谢已产生了适应性变化,决定了乒乓球运动水平的最关键是高原环境对球的飞行影响。比赛、训练场馆所处海拔不同,对乒乓球的球速、旋转会产生较大的影响,最终会影响到运动员的比赛成绩。高原地区海拔高、气压低、空气稀薄、空气干燥,乒乓球的飞行速度、旋转和落地反弹后的前冲速度都要比平原快。虽然高原训练能够提供更快的球速条件给运动员进行适应性训练,但是在高原长期居住、训练的运动员适应了高原训练和比赛,到平原比赛较难适应,这也是多年来高原省份乒乓球项目难以跻身全国前列的原因。
  由于高原球速快,需要运动员具有良好的反应、移动素质,而由于球速快,又造成对高原乒乓球运动员动作结构和习惯思维的不良影响,在专项身体能力的要求高和动作结构的不合理的双重影响下,给高原乒乓球运动员想要提高水平带来了很大的难度。高原地区的运动员挥臂幅度普遍偏小,力量较轻,击球动作也不如平原地区运动员干净利落、舒展。这种新的神经兴奋强度和持续时间短时期不能与大脑皮质的各区域和肌体各系统建立有机的、协调的联系,在平原比赛时会破坏肌肉的协作关系,出现动作僵硬、不协调、不准确,导致比赛的失败。

2. Problems for altitude training in table tennis
Because table tennis players living on a plateau have lived for generations or have lived in hypoxic environments for a long time, their physiological functions, certain tissue structures and biochemical metabolism have undergone adaptive changes, yet the most crucial factor to determining the level of table tennis is the impact of plateau environment on the flight of the ball. Competition and training venues at different altitudes have a greater impact on the velocity and rotation of the table tennis ball, and will ultimately affect the athletes' performance. The high altitude, low air pressure, thin air, and dry air in the plateau area, the mid-air speed, spin and kick of the table tennis ball are faster than on plains. Although altitude training can provide faster ball speed conditions for athletes to carry out adaptive training, athletes who have lived and trained in plateau for a long time have adapted to altitude training and competition, and it is difficult to adapt to competitions on plains. This is the major obstacle preventing plateau provinces from ranking among the top in the country for many years.

Because of the high speed of the ball, the athletes need to have good reaction and movement quality, and due to the fast speed of the ball, it will cause adverse effects on the stroke structure and habitual thinking for plateau table tennis players. Under the double influence of stringent requirements for specific physical ability and unreasonable stroke structure, it has brought great difficulty for plateau table tennis players to improve their skills. Athletes in the plateau area generally have a smaller swing, lighter strength, and their strokes are not as clean and extended as those on the plain. This new nerve excitement intensity and short duration cannot establish an organic and coordinated relationship with the various areas of the cerebral cortex and the various systems of the body. Playing in competitions on the plain will destroy the cooperative relationship of muscles, resulting in rigid, uncoordinated, and inaccurate movements, leading to failure in the match.
 
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Soft to hard rubber, that will deal with your ball contact. Harder rubbers require better brushing techniques.

Shouldn't brush looping be almost the same with hard and soft rubbers?
Since brush looping does not engage the sponge that much.

With thick contact softer rubbers compress faster and the blade will be engaged faster and the sponge will bottom out faster.
So it was my understanding that soft rubbers bottom out faster then hard rubbers on hard hits , not brushing.
I could be wrong though.
 
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I uses soft rubbers both bh, fh. I use ready-made racket and i want to develop my racket. I have good technique which is wide arch topspins, loops. The ball goes off table when i do wide topspins. Therefore, i want to change my rubber hardness to harder ones to keep the ball on table. What are differences i will notice? Is it okay to jump to harder ones from soft? How long will i adapt?

If the rubbers are softer modern dynamic rubbers, there should be PLENTY of spin and dip on a well struck loop... maybe overwhelming spin and drop at end of the ball. If the impact has been developed for a softer rubber, going to med or hard sponge may not exactly result in immediate expected outcome. Those require a different impact... but yes, one can adjust impact with enough time and effort.

Myself, for now, I am better off with softer sponged modern dynamic... some blades medium sponge... that is it for me until I get a little better timing of ball in impact zone.
 
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