Had a long training session yesterday with my practice partner. I'm getting more and more used to the new FH loop motion. It's pretty much at similar consistency level now as the old one in practice, but not yet in games when we practiced a few 3rd ball attacks at the end. This new stroke has naturally great topspin and far less sidespin,
@Der_Echte's fingers will appreciate. I need to drill more to make it my natural FH motion.
On the BH side I'm finally starting to find the BH loop/drive motion. I started finding it last week, and now it's getting better. I can now execute it with either a more brushing or more hitting motion, just like on the FH side, which allowed me to find in practice which balls I can drive and which I must brush in. I'm pretty excited about this development, it just feels so good when I hit it right. I find that leading with my elbow is key to get the best contact and really catch the ball, which I suppose is not surprising.
At the end we had some 3rd ball attack practices. My defence is really starting to become useful, thanks to all the blocking I do during the practice. I'm also trying to figure out ways to 3rd ball attack returns of my new reverse services. I'm really starting to sense that a BH dominant 3rd ball attack is the better option here as I got repeatedly jammed when I tried to pivot to use my FH.
On the exercise front, this type of practice runs longer, gets more intense but also has longer lulls when I just block. I topped out at 178 HR, but averaged only ~110 for the 3 1/2 hour session. As we improve our basics we're gonna start incorporating multiball, and that should up the intensity considerably. Right now we need to work on our blocking as much as our looping, so not quite ready yet.