Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

[dingyibvs]

Aren't this videos like few yrs old now and completely irrelevant? Thought you changed the stroke a lot by now....

Yes, some of the things are pretty irrelevant now, but there are some parts that I've never been able to completely fix, like the backswing to behind my back, for example. The issue is that I tried to be completely relaxed, but what I actually needed to do was to hold my forearm (but not so much the upper arm) out a bit so my racket is a bit farther from my body.

The trick here is that I couldn't just fix that one thing. I needed to combine the with also pointing the racket more to the side than the front. Only the combination of these two things yielded the desired effect, which is why I was never able to come to that conclusion myself.

Similarly for the loop vs backspin video. Reaching too low (which is also a result of not holding my racket more to the side rather than letting it just drop) was still a problem. It's a problem that I didn't even realize I had because it's actually not that obvious, as you're supposed to reach lower against backspins. The other parts of those videos are of course not very relevant anymore.

 

[dingyibvs]

Anyway imo fundamental practice is only useful up to the point where you can move and loop well, after that 90% of table tennis is just the cat and mouse serve and receive game lol. If your serves cause the receiver to make easy mistakes and pop ups, and you are able to decipher and loop all long serves + follow up decisively, and receive the short serves decently well you are most probably gonna win the match.

You can loop like a madman but if you don't have good serve/receive it is all for nothing.

Absolutely, but when service receive games are reasonably close then rally is gonna really make the difference. My rally game is starting to reach a stage where I just need to return half long, long toward the body, or short but not too tight and can win the rally afterwards against most people I used to struggle against.

 

[Gozo Zyreruna]

@dingyibvs ,

Have you ever posted YT of you in real game/ match play?

In tourney or in practice match?

Just curious to see you in action.

 

[dingyibvs]

For BH elbow positioning, I find that using the lats to pull the elbow clockwise (similar to say doing a pullup) is the best power amplifier there is. The tell is that on a full power BH topspin they will have the elbow pointing to the right or even front during the backswing, and then by the end of the swing it is pointing downwards. All of the guys with top BH topspins like Lin Shidong and Fan Zhendong all have it. This also happens to put the shoulder in a better position imo.

Dude I totally know what you mean! That's basically what the coach wanted me to do. I realized that what happens is that as we swing from left/down to right/up, the entire arm is being swung to the right/up. However, if right before impact we use our lats to pull the elbow back left/down so that it's immobilized, then all the momentum gets transferred to the forearm and speeding up the forearm swing.

After I went home I tried my old strokes and the new strokes (where I try to pull my elbow back towars my body) in front of the mirror, I finally realized what was happening. I also realized that despite using a lot of lats force that my elbow actually wasn't being pulled back, it was only just enough force to prevent it from going further right/up.

 

[dingyibvs]

@dingyibvs ,

Have you ever posted YT of you in real game/ match play?

In tourney or in practice match?

Just curious to see you in action.

Not in a long time, but I'll try to record some soon!

 

[dingyibvs]

Had a practice session today, worked on my new FH and BH motions. The FH motion was really easy to implement, it's really all just arm/wrist adjustments since I've been doing pretty well in terms of footwork, body usage, and activation sequence. Sometimes I do tighten up a bit as I focus too much on my arm, but I don't think the FH changes will take too long. It's pretty incredible how much I'm able to vary my power now, I can actually do continuous loops from low to medium to high quite seamlessly.

The new BH motion, however, is a work in progress. With my elbow lower I naturally hold my racket a bit higher, so I need to intentionally start my swing from a lower point. Beside that, the rest of the BH motion like footwork and body usage are also still a work in progress, so trying to implement a new shoulder/arm motion in addition to working on everything else is a lot harder. I'm gonna need to really focus on practicing my BH. One thing I did find is that with the new motion it becomes a LOT easier to attack balls that come to my middle. And of course, my shoulder (mostly deltoid) no longer gets overly fatigued from doing BHs as it's now only used for arm rotation and no longer needed to carry my arm up high the whole time.

I also just purchased an action cam, the DJI Osmo 5 Pro, picked it primarily for the long battery life and ease of use. I don't really do wild outdoor adventures so the GoPro's advantages seemed rather useless to me for more money. It should arrive in a couple of weeks, then I can start recording some matches! My current camera can't record for long before overheating (it's primarily a photography camera), and my phone doesn't have the battery life (and no swappable battery, of course), so this should be a pretty solid option to record entire training/playing sessions, maybe with a battery swap in the middle.

 

[Tyce]

A powerbank might have been cheaper but a good, lightweight dedicated camera should be great.

 

[Amaken23]

Finally had a 'break' after 3 days straight of 3 hour training session with clubmates. Break as in....work since I have entire weekend in work but at least I can let my body rest for a moment.
Package from Aliexpress arrived today with 2 table tennis blades from Loki and one Double Fish Volant Phoenix 2 rubber (all for about ~40 PLN or about 10 euro.) Sadly, I think rubber is a fake since package for it is different than normal but ,oh well, lesson learned, I suppose
As for the blades, they seem to be looking like they are supposed to. Sealed, arrived in bubble wrap and from what I see, they look the same as on Revspin website. Looking forward to buying some rubbers and testing them.

 

[Tyce]

So since I came back last year, I've been putting a lot of effort into fixing my glaring FH issues: playing the shot too close to my body, and slapping uncontrolled shots way too often.
I like to give credit to H3 Neo for forcing me to make more swing, as well as just being really hard to get a whippy slap done with.

Given that, I have been encountering more and more shots where I just miss that middle gear between slow loop and killshot. Even with a boosted sheet I don't get the right click to make it work. This particular sheet also reacted much less to boost so that might be part of it.

Tonight though, I also found my BH to just not make it over the net a little too often. I think my ak47 yellow may have finally experienced sponge death as I felt it was softer already when I played last Monday.
I've got some good thinking ahead of me as to what gear I want to play moving forward.

 

[Gozo Zyreruna]

1. Yesterday had a very intense match.
2. I was down in the two initial sets: Set 1: 11-13 / Set 2: 10-12.
3. In the 3rd set I won by a thin margin. 11-9
4. In the 4th set, I dominated with a 11-2 victory.
5. In the 5th and decider set, this is where it got intense. I was down 1-7 but I won with a scoreline of 12-10. I chased and chased, never giving up. Fight tooth and nail for every point.
6. I won a couple of points through my serves ( short underspin to the FH side ) plus I got two free points from my opponent when his serve did not land on my side of the table. He choked suddenly which I think the mental pressure got the better of him.

 

[yamagata]

I have searched, still I do not get it why some aging players choose the long pips way. My guess it that the rubber is more insensitive to spin. I love spin, however I am an aging beginner, and I have felt the power of pushing (in terms of putting balls on the table), might also be easier to block with long pips, so I pulled the trigger and purchesed long pips from my friend ali e. Question is, am I a chopper or a shopper?

 

[Lazer]

I have searched, still I do not get it why some aging players choose the long pips way. My guess it that the rubber is more insensitive to spin. I love spin, however I am an aging beginner, and I have felt the power of pushing (in terms of putting balls on the table), might also be easier to block with long pips, so I pulled the trigger and purchesed long pips from my friend ali e. Question is, am I a chopper or a shopper?

I just turned 64 and no, things aren’t any easier with long pips… I tried briefly but gave up shortly.
My problem though is not my opponents spin, it’s my own speed. I am getting slow and plays close to table, not the optimum configuration…

Cheers
L-zr

 

[Takkyu_wa_inochi]

TIL i became a teammate of T-leaguer Takako NAGAO (Top Otome Pinponz Nagoya)

2025-2026 シーズン 選手 | 【公式】卓球Tリーグ公式サイト

世界トップクラスの選手達の集う卓球リーグ・Ｔリーグ。選手情報や試合日程、最新ニュースやハイライトなどをお届け。

tleague.jp

There is a local team competition where every district of Tokyo compete against each other.

There is one player selected for each age category (for both Mens and Womens), and i won my category (Senior = 50+) as very few good players showed up this time (previous year there were more players and other categories were much more difficult this year !

 

[dingyibvs]

So I've been practicing the things I learned at the 1-on-1 coaching session over the past week. I learned FH loop vs. topspin, BH counters, BH loop vs. topspin, and FH loop vs. backspin in order, so I've been trying to practice them in order.

FH loop vs. topspin was the easiest. I just needed to adjust my arm a bit, but anything involving FH is hard to practice because it's just so damn exhausting.

BH counters I'm starting to get a hang of it. Last time I mentioned that by dropping my elbow lower my racket would come up a bit, so I needed to lower my racket intentionally before starting the swing. After some practice I'm actually finding that to be perhaps false. I think what I actually should do is to lower my whole body a bit, whether it's with a lower stance or more forward lean I'm not sure yet. I was doing some practices against a return board, and I found that once I lowered my body I was able to get way better shots on the ball, especially on those coming to my middle.

For BH loops I'm having some issues. The coach was teaching me to do a stroke that goes very forward rather than sideways. It's a stroke that's more like ML's than FZD's. I find that when I do that there's a lot more hitting and less brushing, and it's hard to get a good arc with my FZD/D09c setup. If I switch to my W968/H3 setup it works a lot better as it's got much better natural arc to it. I wonder if it's a bit more of an equipment thing or still just a technique thing?

FH loop vs. backspin is the last thing I worked on. It's the most exhausting to practice as it requires a lower stance and with little power for me to borrow when I try to perform a more powerful stroke. It's still quite a work in progress. Basically I'm trying to make the same modifications to my stroke as with my FH loop vs. topspin, with my arm a bit more to my side and using my body for forward momentum while the arm primarily brushes upward. Fatigue is really a limiting factor here. With soccer starting back up this week, I expect that to continue being a limiting factor.

 

[NextLevel]

ask and ye shall receive.
View attachment 35175
View attachment 35176
Warm up session with some club member.

Spoiler: Video of a match below

Actual game.

NB: The first two sets were mistake galore so it is rather boring. The game starts to get a little more exciting from Set 3 onwards ( time stamp: 8mins 20 secs onwards )

I watched the match, you are still a work in progress but the overall improvement is impressive. Well done. I forgot to respond to this when it was posted, so I wanted to make sure I did.

 

[Gozo Zyreruna]

I watched the match, you are still a work in progress but the overall improvement is impressive. Well done. I forgot to respond to this when it was posted, so I wanted to make sure I did.

I am happy with my own progress as well NL, and happier to say that I totally agree with you that I am still a work in progress. I am adding new arsenal to my game and evolving. I feel that I hit a plateau some time back, but overcame it and now onto the next phase.

 

[NextLevel]

I am happy with my own progress as well NL, and happier to say that I totally agree with you that I am still a work in progress. I am adding new arsenal to my game and evolving. I feel that I hit a plateau some time back, but overcame it and now onto the next phase.

Do you appreciate a bit better why people were telling to focus on brushing the ball?

 

[Gozo Zyreruna]

Do you appreciate a bit better why people were telling to focus on brushing the ball?

I know! I know! This is NL's way of saying, "Hah! I told you so!"

Let me relate to you a story.

Once upon a time, a father tried to teach his three year old son how to ride a tricycle. No matter how much he taught the son, the son just could not do it, not for the lack of effort for sure. It was because the youngling has not develop the muscle to pedal. So, the father gave up in frustration.

Two years later, at the age of five, the son, without any effort or further teaching, he was able to pedal to his heart's content, much to the father's elation. No effort on the father and yet the son was able to do what he intended earlier. My guess is, the boy now has develop his muscle to power through the pedal.

This story just highlight, when the student isn't ready, no amount of teaching can help.

Similarly, the earlier Gozo was not ready to brush the ball, now he is. All those earlier advise, lessons are kept in his sub-conscious mind and when the time is ready, it just work automatically. When the conditions are right, action manifest itself without further effort. Such is the universal law of cause and effect.

 

[NextLevel]

I know! I know! This is NL's way of saying, "Hah! I told you so!"

Let me relate to you a story.

Once upon a time, a father tried to teach his three year old son how to ride a tricycle. No matter how much he taught the son, the son just could not do it, not for the lack of effort for sure. It was because the youngling has not develop the muscle to pedal. So, the father gave up in frustration.

Two years later, at the age of five, the son, without any effort or further teaching, he was able to pedal to his heart's content, much to the father's elation. No effort on the father and yet the son was able to do what he intended earlier. My guess is, the boy now has develop his muscle to power through the pedal.

This story just highlight, when the student isn't ready, no amount of teaching can help.

Similarly, the earlier Gozo was not ready to brush the ball, now he is. All those earlier advise, lessons are kept in his sub-conscious mind and when the time is ready, it just work automatically. When the conditions are right, action manifest itself without further effort. Such is the universal law of cause and effect.

Haha. Nice try, Gozo. You will find that if you don't continue to consciously improve it, you will still stagnate. It's not so much cause and effect but the only way to get better at modern table tennis especially when you can't get to the ball early all the time.

 

[suds79]

So as a penholder, I've been a long time fan of Kaii Yoshida. That's how I've always known him.

I've recently stumbled upon (I think it's the same league) that always mentions him as Kaii Konishi.

Did he change his name or is this just some sort of strange translation thing? Doesn't matter all that much I suppose but was just curious if anyone knew.