Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

[Der_Echte]

For NL, who calls me High Toss Servy Dude or High Toss Servy Bast**d...

Larry Hodges pimping the high toss serve.

http://tabletenniscoaching.com/node/1471

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

I got to play tonight which was nice. I got to play two guys with pips. One of them had an awesome loop and the pips on his BH. I played pretty decently against him but lost in the 5th.

The other guy had the pips on his FH and he was a penholder with an evil RPB that sometimes was as dead as if he had pips and sometimes it had spin. We split matches. The first match I was up and relaxed because I had beaten him in the 2 games I won too easily and he caught up to my tactics. But in the second match, I just kept switching up the tactics to keep him more off balance and he kept giving me lose balls to my FH. So I won that second match pretty easily.

Then I did some 3rd ball attack drills with one of my main training partners. It was nice to get to play on a weeknight. I may get 3 days of play in this week.


Sent from the Subterranean Workshop by Telepathy

 

[Archosaurus]

Lately, I've sucked. Normally I'm not that good, but we're talking about some real suckage here. Mentally and physically I've been in a rut and my muscles feel too cold and body too heavy all the time.

I suspected it, but I'm sick now! Now that excuse is actually valid. Perhaps one of the rare times in table tennis history when it's been so.

 

[Shuki]

Lately, I've sucked. Normally I'm not that good, but we're talking about some real suckage here. Mentally and physically I've been in a rut and my muscles feel too cold and body too heavy all the time.

I suspected it, but I'm sick now! Now that excuse is actually valid. Perhaps one of the rare times in table tennis history when it's been so.

not that rare, I've been sick but unable to resist playing before. My solution, firstly brought hand sanitizer and before playing my opponent I excused myself and told them I was sick and because of this I won't be shaking their hand after our match. Me touching the ball may bother some players as they have to touch it too, and thus the hand sanitizer so we can use it afterwards.

Also make sure to tell them you're going to kick their butt regardless of how you're feeling! Nobody likes to play against someone making excuses

 

[Shuki]

Just won intramurals at my university. Prize was a shirt that says Intramural Champion with our school's logo. It doesn't say a specific sport so I planned on telling people 1 on 1 basketball. I go to KU, where the sport was invented so I thought that would be an impressive sport of choice.

But alas. Girlfriend stole my shirt! She wore it and got asked all day what sport she did! Apparently she was the table tennis champion and not me

 

[suds79]

So recently I've been playing probably the weirdest style yet with good results. That's penhold with Long pips FH & Inverted BH. I use to play SP FH. I'm also trying to learn to drive or counter through topspin more with the LPs which is surprisingly not that far off from a controlled SP stroke. At home vs the robot, which puts a good amount of topspin & pace on the ball, it's pretty easy.

Anyways, I'm finding this style (while giving everybody fits) is more effective vs spin players who play fast. I'm hitting with my buddy at work over lunch. He's only been playing for about a year and hits significantly slower & less spin than my training partner at club. While I beat him, it's not as convincing as you'd imagine with one person having around 10 years exp vs 1. It's like this style somewhat plays to the level of your competition. Fast spiny players will struggle. Newer players won't notice as much... But you should beat newer players with experience & consistency anyways I figure.

It's those dang slower almost no-spin balls. They're simply harder to play with the LPs. I've mainly been telling myself when i hit with the new guy that if the ball becomes too slow or spinless, RPB with the inverted as either a kill shot or simply to get some more spin back in the game. It works for now but I'd like to be able to play those shots better with the LPs.

I can't figure out if I should continue to try to learn to either counter drive or swipe those into play or play the more safer push shot, which really deadens the ball.

We're hitting today again over lunch and since it is practice, I'm really going to use that time to try to attack those balls more even if it means more errors... That's what practice is for anyways right?

I'm looking to get some video at club this week where I can post it here asking for pointers so be on the lookout.

 

[NextLevel]

Look for videos of Dickie Fleisher. You may have already but that is where to start, I think. The style you are playing requires great touch. Good luck with it.

For lower rated players, and in general, the solution is spinnier serves with inverted. Doing everything with the pips puts too much pressure on your hiting game.

 

[Archosaurus]

I decided to kick my sickness' ass today.

I made sure I was warmed up and tried to play a more "mobility limited" style due to not being able to use much energy. I did much better than most of the week. I got my fair share of block and push points instead of just pure attacking. The penholder I play with has learned a low, short, pretty heavy backspin serve, and I had a lot of fun pushing that back equally low and short. I'm also not really fit to use much power now, so I focused on looping slow and heavy without that much spin but a high spin/speed ratio. It was easy and relaxing and seemed to work combined with my blocking game.

I had to compensate some parts of my game, so I focused on serves. I've got very inspired by these two serves from Ma Lin at 4:53:

and I've started using a modified shakehand version of that followthrough. My serve is now good enough that it won't suffer if I add a more complex followthrough to it, so I can do backspin, back/side and topspin variations with the same movement. I don't think I have enough fingers to count how many free points I got from that today!

I also threw a really spun up half-long reverse pendulum at the penholder today. About 5/6 sidespin and 1/6 topspin. He froze when it came at him and it hit him in the fingers, making him drop his bat. I wish I could have captured his face. According to what I've heard, even having a reverse pendulum at such a low level is extremely rare, so I'm not too surprised.

I still need to improve my whip mechanics, though.

 

[Boogar]

I decided to kick my sickness' ass today.

I made sure I was warmed up and tried to play a more "mobility limited" style due to not being able to use much energy. I did much better than most of the week. I got my fair share of block and push points instead of just pure attacking. The penholder I play with has learned a low, short, pretty heavy backspin serve, and I had a lot of fun pushing that back equally low and short. I'm also not really fit to use much power now, so I focused on looping slow and heavy without that much spin but a high spin/speed ratio. It was easy and relaxing and seemed to work combined with my blocking game.

I had to compensate some parts of my game, so I focused on serves. I've got very inspired by these two serves from Ma Lin at 4:53:

and I've started using a modified shakehand version of that followthrough. My serve is now good enough that it won't suffer if I add a more complex followthrough to it, so I can do backspin, back/side and topspin variations with the same movement. I don't think I have enough fingers to count how many free points I got from that today!

I also threw a really spun up half-long reverse pendulum at the penholder today. About 5/6 sidespin and 1/6 topspin. He froze when it came at him and it hit him in the fingers, making him drop his bat. I wish I could have captured his face. According to what I've heard, even having a reverse pendulum at such a low level is extremely rare, so I'm not too surprised.

I still need to improve my whip mechanics, though.

Typical Archo post >.<

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

View attachment 11235
Went to TT tournament in Fujioka city to watch my daughter play yesterday.

May I ask how she fared?

Great pic! I've found sometimes I don't play as well in an environment like that ... i don't know what it is, but if there are no barriers and it's just one open space with many tables, i seem to lose my sense of spatial relations. I don't know how to describe it properly and don't even know if others get this sensation also.

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@Archo

Speedy & healthy recovery!

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Just won intramurals at my university. Prize was a shirt that says Intramural Champion with our school's logo.

CONGRATULATIONS!!! That's awesome news!

LOL at your GF

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So recently I've been playing probably the weirdest style yet with good results. That's penhold with Long pips FH & Inverted BH.

I may try this style at some point, but it would probably be way later and also as a twiddler. Will be following your progress reports with interest!

Anyways, I'm finding this style (while giving everybody fits) is more effective vs spin players who play fast.

Perhaps they don't know how to play against LP yet? Or perhaps they don't have enough experience yet? Guessing your partners have not had enough experience playing vs LP yet.

Good luck!

 

[Archosaurus]

OSPH, cheers.

How do you like reverse pendulum serves to the backhand? Is it a weakness for penholders? I think my partner has problems pushing it back from his backhand wing. Is the angle for the sidespin hard with TPB?


Boogar, explain. What exactly do you want me to post, then?

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

Slow is a relative term. The main thing is that your emphasis is on spin, not pace. If I just roll a serve, sometimes, I am trying to put more into the spin than the pace. It might not be super slow, but it is not a power loop. The contact is more thin brush than thick brush or drive. Therefore, the way the ball hits your rubber usually means that you have to be at a higher point on the ball or avoid the spin more than you would if I had hit it harder or put less spin on it. It's a similar trick to being able to serve heavy spin without making it look like you are serving heavy spin.

The thing is that trying to make the ball go as fast as possible without getting used to spin contact is going to limit your options in the long term. I like to tell my students that whatever the limitations of my game, I like to think of myself as a ball bender and that I can put the ball where I want to and when I want to. That said, there can be good reasons not to play like this. But I prefer to loop and know that my opponent can still block my ball off the table than to loop hard and then have to reloop because my opponent is making easy blocks. But of course, everything according to customer. And the main point is that it is not about the speed per se, but about the dominance of the spin effect over the speed effect. Slow is just a way of measuring this - fast swing + slow speed = high spin. Sometimes, you can loop a high ball this way to a blocker if you know he likes to block with open angles as the spin will mess him up for than a fast smash, For some people it is the opposite.

As always Sir, thank you! I have a lot to work on.

----------------------------------------------------

Today i played the University tournament. I got second place overall.

That is awesome Boogar! CONGRATULATIONS!!

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

How do you like reverse pendulum serves to the backhand? Is it a weakness for penholders? I think my partner has problems pushing it back from his backhand wing. Is the angle for the sidespin hard with TPB?

I cannot make a blanket statement. I will tell you about me though.

There are times my partners try a reverse pendulum serve but they don't have the stroke/mechanics down smoothly yet ... and when my mind is fresh earlier in the evening, I return them decently enough. Then there are times when it's later in the evening and my mind and body is much slower and those same serves would get me as I'm mentally slow in telling my body what to do and my body is slow in as it's tired also.

Then there are reverse pendulum servers who are like Boogar and have a smooth motion and is fast in executing the serve ... if i face those servers, they will get a freebie off of me.

 

[Archosaurus]

OSPH, so you feel that it's more so player specific than penhold specific?

Why do you have difficulty returning smooth, fast executed serves? Is the quality of the ball higher, or do you have difficulty reading it?

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

How do you like reverse pendulum serves to the backhand? Is it a weakness for penholders? I think my partner has problems pushing it back from his backhand wing. Is the angle for the sidespin hard with TPB?

This is how I would think about this. The sidespin on a regular pendulum is harder to handle on the BH side until you know how to get on the inside of the spin. And then it is not a big deal. The sidespin on a reverse spin serve is a little more awkward to handle on the FH side until you know how to get on the inside of the spin. Then it is not so hard to handle.

If someone has trouble handling a particular serve, it represents some flaw in their reading the spin or familiarity to the serve. At the level you play at, it is probably just that this guy has not seen that serve enough yet. When he adjusts to it, he will stop having problems with the serve.

This is the same thing said a different way: if he is used to receiving a regular pendulum with his TP BH and is not adjusting to the sidespin on the reverse serve, with small easy adjustment that is much more natural to the wrist than what you do counter a regular pendulum, he will no longer have any problem with the serve.

Therefore, save that serve for big points on him so he doesn't get too used to it. Because once he does, it will be all over.

 

[ttpshot]

May I ask how she fared?

Great pic! I've found sometimes I don't play as well in an environment like that ... i don't know what it is, but if there are no barriers and it's just one open space with many tables, i seem to lose my sense of spatial relations. I don't know how to describe it properly and don't even know if others get this sensation also.

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Good luck!

She went out in 3rd round, played in U12 as a 9yrs old but could've won a few more matches I thought!
Playing in an open space is good and bad, good as you said and bad as there're much more lets!

 

[thekleifheit13]

I went to the local league run by Samson Dubina last night for my first competitive TT in about 6 months. There were 5 groups and I was placed in group 3, where the lowest rated player was about 1000 and the top player was 1550 USATT. Overall I was thrilled with the way I played – finally had some confidence in my offensive capabilities and learned more about how I can shape the rallies with my serve type and location.

Match 1: I played Tom, an older Polish (?) gentleman that plays a very old school hitting game and is USATT 1300/1400 IIRC. I have played him before and never even taken a game off of him in 3 matches, so I was nervous. In the first game I missed 4 serves and didn’t return any of his long serves because of the speed and lack of spin. Lost 11-4 and things weren’t looking good. I backed away from the table and calmed down a bit, started serving short and used my tomahawk serves a lot after that. Ended up winning the match 3-1 and had a few really nice loops that were powerful enough for him to shoot over my head. Gained some confidence in my attacking game.

Match 2: Paul, a pretty decent (compared to me) player with a lot of hitting power and good, short serves. I could tell right away he had a hard time dealing with spin, so I just served heavy underspin and looped/flipped his push. I did miss all sorts of BH loops because I was following through way too far to my left. Other than that, this match went well and I took it 3-0.



Match 3: Scott, the low seed in the bracket, won out of the lower division last week. He serves spinny but high and blocks well, and his attacks are not bad. He does not attack very often at all, so his game is mostly blocking, lobbing, and placement. He could not handle my serves or attacks, so I took the match 3-0.

Match 4: Bimal, the highest seed in the bracket. His USATT rating is 1550 but is over a year old. I would say he is definitely over 1600 after playing him. He is a two-winged looper that has above average power and placement, but no way to return short serves aggressively. Knowing he was good, I was nervous and missed many, many attacks. I set the points up well and played the right strategy, and when I did land an attack he either missed totally or lobbed. But I wasn’t consistent enough and he took it 3-0. I don’t like losing to guys with his attitude either, so I’m gonna come back gunning to beat him.

Match 5: David, a Korean RSM disciple with a lot of power and a pretty good TPB loop. He was a lot of fun to warm up against and his looping and placement helped me get a counterloop down well enough to use it in games. He couldn’t handle my tomahawk serves, while I kept missing his heavy underspin serve to my FH. Eventually, we both started serving easier to get into rallies and had a blast. I won the first two games and he won the next two, then we went to 9-9 in the 5th. I set up the best 3rd ball attack of my life, which he almost got a paddle on, and went up 10-9. The next serve he bumped back over the net and I popped up. He ripped a smash at my backhand side and I flinched, probably hit the ball 15 feet in the air, and it caught the corner of the table for the win.

After that, I stretched a lot, worked on a couple FH loops against block, and got outta there. I need to drill the hell outta my BH and work on freeing my wrist up more for all shots. All in all, I was very happy with my play.

 

[laistrogian]

He's at school in minnisota right now, I still play with his sister and his dad. His dad is right at 1960. I also beat sam at our last tournament together in may. But in his defense, he had a LOT on his mind.

Laistrogian, maybe I'll see you at regionals after I get my team through divisionals. Good luck against lindenwood, but you've got Pu

I'm not even on the school team as all of them are better than me

So you've known Pu already? Where did you meet him?

 

[Archosaurus]

@UpSideDownCarl

To clarify:

When receiving regular pendulum sidespin from a right hander as a right hander, you want to touch on the right side, and angle your blade to the left, right?

For reverse, you want to touch on the left and angle towards the right?

Isn't receiving reverse pendulum harder with TPB, given this? Or is it actually easier to angle? Do I have the directions mixed up somehow?

I pulled the serve out at 10-8, my match point. It's a slightly risky but very reliable way of winning points if I land it well.

However in the light of improving, would it be a good idea to actually teach all of my set points to my peers by using them until they figure them out, so I'm forced to improve?

For example, for some time my 3rd ball pivot kept getting blocked back because I hit it too flat, even though it went down the line and fast with some hook. I had to really improve my forehand footwork to deal with the returns, and I learned to spin up my 3rd ball more with a later, lower contact and more emphasis on placement. Now it feels much more like I'm controlling the ball than just hitting it hard. 3rd ball pivot is effective again and I've improved.

Is it a sound strategy to just find out what gives me points and keep doing it until people have adapted to it well and then I am forced to improve it?
Right now the penholder keeps serving backspin to me, and I keep pushing it to him with variance and he just can't do anything to the pushes. Soon he will catch on, and I will need to improve my push, right?

 

[NextLevel]

Typical Archo post >.<

That's why he is on my ignore list - so I don't feel compelled to respond to such stuff anymore.