Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

[blahness]

That's just one shot per point though. Even in practice it's gonna be far lower frequency than BH-BH counters for example. When I practice with the robot, I do 80-90 shots/min for regular BH practice, while 40 for chiquitas.

In any case, I've always found chiquitas to be the hardest on my shoulder. The massive external rotation gives me shoulder pain and was one of the reasons I kept trying RPB. With RPB you naturally hold the racket with the head pointing more downwards, which reduces the amount of internal rotation I need to get ready for the shot (assuming against backspin) and therefore the amount of external rotation I need to execute it.

There's a secret to the modern chiquita - they don't raise the elbow to drop the racket anymore. However, you can still do it the old way with the elbow raised and bat pointing downwards which produces a different combination of spin and speed than the modern type.

now how does this work against underspin? For the longest time this puzzled me until I noticed that the more backspin the pros encountered the more closed angle the began their stroke with which was the most counter-intuitive crap I've seen. But it makes sense because youre going from closed to open in the 1st lifting phase. The more backspin the more lift you need so it has to start more closed in fact. So how it works is actually the bat angle starts closed and goes increasingly open as you approach the ball - and this is actually how the lift against backspin is happening, of course with the help of the body and legs. Then once you contact the ball and lifted it up you press it down again towards the right and downwards. With this method - you're working with the backspin rather than against it. No need to go excessively to the side to avoid the backspin. With this method, backspin is no longer scary for chiquita. The hard part is when the person serves very low with unknown spin, now you're wondering how much lift to give to the ball.

This concept also works for the full BH against backspin and is something Darko uses. You can see his blade angle going from closed to open and then towards right and down in his loopkills against backspin. It is a unique stroke and I learnt why it was so effective - he is completely unafraid of lifting backspin with this stroke structure which is why he powerloops them like they're nothing. Ironically his BH against topspin is a lot worse than his BH against backspin.

 

[blahness]

I am still yet to find a more reliable way to chiquita everything.

I can do banana on no spin and light topspin, but heavy backspin or moderate backspin I can't.
The way I am doing it is contacting the ball at the point that is closest to me instead of on the side, and I am going over the top of the ball rather than on the side.

I think some people do it by contacting the side. How do you do it? Do you have a video of you performing it?

You need to know how to contact the bottom of the ball and still generate a lot of spin if you're facing against any kind of serious backspin.

 

[Der_Echte]

That's just one shot per point though. Even in practice it's gonna be far lower frequency than BH-BH counters for example. When I practice with the robot, I do 80-90 shots/min for regular BH practice, while 40 for chiquitas.

In any case, I've always found chiquitas to be the hardest on my shoulder. The massive external rotation gives me shoulder pain and was one of the reasons I kept trying RPB. With RPB you naturally hold the racket with the head pointing more downwards, which reduces the amount of internal rotation I need to get ready for the shot (assuming against backspin) and therefore the amount of external rotation I need to execute it.

Hi Big D,

You shouldn't be feeling the shoulder on a banana flip...

... for lower power it is a squeeze with the fingers blade tip down striking back of the ball... elbow to side and front of ball. Very easy on body, but not a lot of power given to ball... but very consistent shot. Oh, and impact ball on its way DOWN, like maybe a few inches above table top (the stroke is a lifting one, so this is possible and actually more consistent) your stroke is pretty much sideways to your left (as a RH) and forward at impact.
So YES, it is possible to SQUEEZE a banana flip in, maybe a find a vid where a Korean speaking japnaese youtuber in Korea shows this for amateurs.

... for some moar oomph on the banana, same tip down start, same elbow in front and side for leverage... but the lower arm and wrist get involved... this gives more pace and spin... while still being safe... let ball fall lower than you think...

This will never tax your shoulder as you are not torquing the shoulder. The fulcrum and pivot point is the elbow... the upper arm remains in steady position and is rotating in a small circle maybe 90 degrees.

Imagine performing the stroke while holding your hitting arm on your bicep with your non hitting hand... and doing the stroke motion. That is how little to none your upper arm and shoulder move on this shot.

I will be at Shashin's San Ramon club this Fri PM (5-7ish) and Sat AM (10-12) and will prolly go to another TT club afterwards with Ali, he is a guy I help... let me know if you wanna meetup, I will show you in under 5 minutes how to do the biomechanics. let me know what club you would like to meet us... last time I saw you it was TTA, but maybe you have a club closer to you. maybe San Ramon is close enough. maybe we go to ur garage, about everything is possible.

 

[Der_Echte]

The basic banana is what I show first, then straight flip, and what I call hybrid which is in between. There are advantages to each and trade offs.

Haruka, the girl in the vid is showing a way to squeeze the BH for a flip, she starts a 3:00 and gets some more at 3:13, then spends the rest of the vid showing and having others do it.

 

[Der_Echte]

Ironically, at 3:23, she talks about how a certain flip technique will make your arm hurt. (she demonstrates how the pros do it with big pre-loading.

 

[NextLevel]

This will never tax your shoulder as you are not torquing the shoulder. The fulcrum and pivot point is the elbow... the upper arm remains in steady position and is rotating in a small circle maybe 90 degrees.

Amen.

 

[dingyibvs]

Thanks guys, I do suspect that I've been doing it wrong. I won't be working on that for a while (gonna get the basics down first, FH/BH, short game, etc.), but when I get to chiquitas again I'll keep these things in mind.

BTW @Der_Echte I can't meet up with you this wkd. I'm in the east coast visiting parents right now, won't be back till Monday. If you come down often then we'll meet again sooner rather than later!

 

[Emin]

I saw some Videos of you playing before and I liked your style. I could see similarities between us.
Imo, Improving receive with pushes and short balls instead of going for aggressive Flips would be more efficient for you.
Its easier to learn and execute, more safe, forgiving imperfect setup and still deadly.

Being capable of flipping some balls here and then is a good skill to have, but trying to play like FZD and WCQ and flip 90% of serves Over the table is not very reasonable and achievable for us, considering our Training and other capabilities.

I dont know much about how your opponent play and what type of equipment they use, but we have a lot of Potential in our short game and over the table with short pushes, drop shots, sidespin long pushes, fast empty pushes etc. .

By we I mean our playing style and Equipment. Tacky, spinny, Controlled Equipment.

I would advise you to not put too much effort into flips, as you said.
Improve your strengths, and make your weaknesses strong enough to not be game losging weaknesses.
Improve the "passive" shots to put Pressure on your opponent without Looping.

And for practicing the offensive, I am a fan of realistic Loop Training. Meaning:
- Vary Spin, placement, speed and randomness of the balls you want to loop
- 3rd Ball Loop Training
- Pivot Loop training
- Training game sequences
(serve into Looping a long push
short push into Looping random long Ball, backhand slow open up into forehand killer,
Fast Serve into step back and counter Loop,
Practicing a theotetical cenario that could happen,
Replaying points from your Matches or from a (pro-)match you watched,
The list goes on)

Take Things one at a time.
For 3rd Ball Attack, check your footwork first.

Dont train like a NPC, be smart about it.
Work hard AND smart.

Those are some things that Helped me and are still helping me and I would recommend those not only to you, but others as well.

And its fun!

 

[Der_Echte]

Thanks guys, I do suspect that I've been doing it wrong. I won't be working on that for a while (gonna get the basics down first, FH/BH, short game, etc.), but when I get to chiquitas again I'll keep these things in mind.

BTW @Der_Echte I can't meet up with you this wkd. I'm in the east coast visiting parents right now, won't be back till Monday. If you come down often then we'll meet again sooner rather than later!

hahah, I just got back from Boston from being at my daughter's place. Got to meet my Ukrainian friend Leo who still plays 2000 level at age 72.

 

[dingyibvs]

I saw some Videos of you playing before and I liked your style. I could see similarities between us.
Imo, Improving receive with pushes and short balls instead of going for aggressive Flips would be more efficient for you.
Its easier to learn and execute, more safe, forgiving imperfect setup and still deadly.

Being capable of flipping some balls here and then is a good skill to have, but trying to play like FZD and WCQ and flip 90% of serves Over the table is not very reasonable and achievable for us, considering our Training and other capabilities.

I dont know much about how your opponent play and what type of equipment they use, but we have a lot of Potential in our short game and over the table with short pushes, drop shots, sidespin long pushes, fast empty pushes etc. .

By we I mean our playing style and Equipment. Tacky, spinny, Controlled Equipment.

I would advise you to not put too much effort into flips, as you said.
Improve your strengths, and make your weaknesses strong enough to not be game losging weaknesses.
Improve the "passive" shots to put Pressure on your opponent without Looping.

And for practicing the offensive, I am a fan of realistic Loop Training. Meaning:
- Vary Spin, placement, speed and randomness of the balls you want to loop
- 3rd Ball Loop Training
- Pivot Loop training
- Training game sequences
(serve into Looping a long push
short push into Looping random long Ball, backhand slow open up into forehand killer,
Fast Serve into step back and counter Loop,
Practicing a theotetical cenario that could happen,
Replaying points from your Matches or from a (pro-)match you watched,
The list goes on)

Take Things one at a time.
For 3rd Ball Attack, check your footwork first.

Dont train like a NPC, be smart about it.
Work hard AND smart.

Those are some things that Helped me and are still helping me and I would recommend those not only to you, but others as well.

And its fun!

Totally, I have a set schedule for myself. First is to improve my huge game-losing weakness, which is my BH. Next is the short game.

Before I got my recent BH lesson I thought I was starting to plateau with my BH and was ready to move on to the short game. I bought a relatively cheap table-top robot and a projector stand so I can place it wherever I want. It's infinitely better than the Amicus robot at simulating services. The Amicus' deflector system and fixed position really limit the type of services that can be made.

Even after a single practice, I learned so much by trying to replicate Fang Bo's teachings on how to return topspins short. I used it once against an opponent who's close to my level and he was so shocked that he didn't even get to the ball before it bounced twice on his side

I'm not confident enough to use it regularly in games yet, but my touch in the short game is already much better. I'm gonna start using it more at the end of my practices when I'm tired from high intensity training. As for flicks, I think I'll only use it against topspins for now and if I guess right and get into position in time then I'll push some short to mix things up.

I'm a big Ma Long fan, so I'd like to one day be able to mix things up like him especially in the short game and use a powerful FH to win the point.

 

[JeffM]

I woke up early to play at the doubles session this morning, making it 3x tt this week. 70 ppl turned up to the session!

There was no warm up, or any meaningful warm up. It was straight into doubles, and the level is often too low. They often try pair me up with someone much weaker so they can make the games more fair. So winning isn't part of my priority.

I tried to practice using my bh more often and to banana serves, some worked, but some didn't. The % isn't high enough for me to say that I would use it if I want to win the point. I suspect I really need some multiball practice to get my confidence up and going. Doing it here and there in a match situation doesn't help.

I did have some singles time today but sort of got told off for doing singles.. The first time was old coach telling us that we shouldn't be doing it when there are so many people around, but in defence, we only did it when there were at least 1 other free table at the time. So when we got told off, we ceased our game. Another time later, there were fewer people, and so we resumed, then the club president came over and said we have to play doubles (even though there are now several tables free). So we found some other players and played doubles. Eventually there were significantly less players around, so we restart and just did a best to 5. My forehands are still pretty good, but I realised even though I have more serves up my sleeve now, my signature serve isn't as good as it was, I was not able to get it short and loaded with the heaviest spin possible. This is a bit disappointing for me but it is something that I would need to practice when I get the opportunity (unlikely to be anytime soon).

 

[Emin]

I have 2 return boards at home.
The cost of both combined was less than 80 Euros.

That enables me to train well in many different ways.
From Multiball to serve return to FH/BH drills.
A robot would be my next big step, once I decide to spend the money on it.
Sometimes I skip training when I know that there wont be a player good enough to practice with.
Instead I practice at home for my own purpose.

It took me some time to figure out the right setup.
For example: One board to return underspin long into a loop rally.
I am still figuring out new things but so far I am doing quite well.
I greatly improved my technique, consistency, footwork, anticipation and awareness leading to more confidence and a better gameplay overall.

It allows me to work on details and improve certain parts specifically.
Focusing on 1 aspect per training session and then implementing it is usually the most effective.

PS: I have recently been working with this playlist from the Korean pros.
Another thing I can recommend.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrz6sukJqBfcDTO0sNtDToR6S909Ry763

( and I can test new equipment whenever I want )

 

[NextLevel]

Yesterday, I went to a neighbor's house. He has a table in his garage and I played a few matches with him and his friend and kids, all to 21, lowest handicap 15, largest handicap 18. I don't think I won any of the 18 handicaps and I won most of the 15s though I might have lost a couple. It was a reminder that my style doesn't easily translate to high risk handicap matches since I don't defend by backing off the table to give myself more time (my knees don't let me really sprint).

Today, went to my friend's church and played the usual Saturday morning routine of giving them someone to target. I think both of them got a game off me in one match each (all matches are best of 3 to keep people not sitting for too long, and everyone leaves after two matches, win or lose). We played in a room that wasn't the usual room, and I think that was an interesting change. I have started playing more with the Szocs signature 1 and in order to compare Golden Tango to Razka Z Extra Hard, I switched up the rubbers.

I then went for coaching and my coach watched my match. He said that I should get out the habit of pushing with my backhand on the forehand side against most serves because my footwork and forehand push were better and the forehand push actually gave me more options and quality. While playing shots, I noticed the smaller sweet spot of the all wood blade and again realized that there was a technical adjustment available to me to try to get the ball in the sweet spot all the time, something that using carbon blades had probably made less obvious. Will work on that for a bit. Coach also said that since I am two winged, that I should switch from serving to the middle to serving into the short forehand and that the third ball options I would have with my placement would be helpful. So I will mostly serve short forehand and long backhand for a bit.

All in all a good day, but a lot of work and personal stuff ahead.

 

[JeffM]

I just found out that the TT club will be closed from mid Dec to start of Feb due to the basketball court needing some floor changing...
This will be a long summer.

 

[Archosaurus]

One week on since my injury, doesn't hurt when I load leg anymore, back doesn't hurt anymore, but I definitely pinched a nerve somewhere in the glute-outer hip vicinity. It has a low range of motion and walking is uncomfortable due to the twisting and turning movements.

Same symptoms as a prior nerve pinch years ago in my back, same treatment. Much milder than that one, though. I might be able to just stretch and massage it out by next week.

Given this information, I think it came from not warming up enough prior, and then doing too intensive squats during rallies.

 

[JeffM]

One week on since my injury, doesn't hurt when I load leg anymore, back doesn't hurt anymore, but I definitely pinched a nerve somewhere in the glute-outer hip vicinity. It has a low range of motion and walking is uncomfortable due to the twisting and turning movements.

Same symptoms as a prior nerve pinch years ago in my back, same treatment. Much milder than that one, though. I might be able to just stretch and massage it out by next week.

Given this information, I think it came from not warming up enough prior, and then doing too intensive squats during rallies.

Do you have a warm up routine that you do every time before you start playing?
I don't mean drills but stretches etc.

 

[dingyibvs]

One week on since my injury, doesn't hurt when I load leg anymore, back doesn't hurt anymore, but I definitely pinched a nerve somewhere in the glute-outer hip vicinity. It has a low range of motion and walking is uncomfortable due to the twisting and turning movements.

Same symptoms as a prior nerve pinch years ago in my back, same treatment. Much milder than that one, though. I might be able to just stretch and massage it out by next week.

Given this information, I think it came from not warming up enough prior, and then doing too intensive squats during rallies.

Have you tried some piriformis stretches? Not many muscle injuries pinch a nerve in the leg/butt area that sure is one!

 

[Archosaurus]

Do you have a warm up routine that you do every time before you start playing?
I don't mean drills but stretches etc.

I used to, but I neglected to do all of them those times. You get what you sow.

I'm a fan of dynamic warmup, not so much stretches. Stretches are for after; which I did not do same day, but day after. I could have maybe avoided it had I done stretches during the first day.

Have you tried some piriformis stretches? Not many muscle injuries pinch a nerve in the leg/butt area that sure is one!

No, but I will look into it.

EDIT: I think you're on the money. I did a few stretches and the discomfort during walking is largely gone. Still some very specific multi-axis turning motions when loaded are a bit tight but I think that is the main culprit. My other side is not tight at all, I can barely get my knee high enough to feel anything.

 

[JeffM]

piriformis syndrome vs sciatica?

 

[Archosaurus]

piriformis syndrome vs sciatica?

I had some of what appeared to have been the latter, but not anymore. That passed in two days or so. It could have just been the whole leg and back being sore, though. I had something similar when I started doing standing work in work boots for the first time; could barely walk after I came home. Maybe it's something similar this time; typical fatigue. Either way it passed.

I do have a bit of a muscle knot kind of feeling in my right cheek, so there's something there. It's not super bad right now. Stretches did work.

If I was younger and less responsible I'd hit the club in a day or two, but I know now it is wiser to over-correct the treatment a bit just to make sure. Sit on it a few days (hehe) without any symptoms and keep doing rehab.