Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

[kindof99]

Yeah, you're right. I tend to not do it as severely against strong players, though, mainly because you just can't. The problem is when I'm not rushed, I tend to be late for the next ball because I'm just looking at the old one. So I should definitely just eliminate that.

My right arm is a bit ahead of my body, not even in sync. I haven't really found how to do the "whipping" or "roping" motion without also putting a ton of quality on the ball and making the shot a bit less consistent. I'll film a few of those next time too, though; maybe they're correct and I just need to make it my default shot.

I can see that you missed many balls in your practice and your match. One thing I saw is that you started your right shoulder to bring your arm to hit the ball, which is one reason that you missed all the shots. Starting with your shoulder, your paddle can hit anywhere. Watch some online tutorial videos. Focus on pushing your leg forward (for power) and the head of your paddle (ban tou) for contact and spin.
It is hard to understand just from the text. I guess it is always better to ask someone in your club that understands the technique to help you.

 

[Archosaurus]

I can see that you missed many balls in your practice and your match. One thing I saw is that you started your right shoulder to bring your arm to hit the ball, which is one reason that you missed all the shots. Starting with your shoulder, your paddle can hit anywhere. Watch some online tutorial videos. Focus on pushing your leg forward (for power) and the head of your paddle (ban tou) for contact and spin.
It is hard to understand just from the text. I guess it is always better to ask someone in your club that understands the technique to help you.

Let me just confirm I'm understanding right. You say I started the swing from the shoulder, but I'm not so sure about that. What is pretty clear is that I end it with the shoulder. There's also for sure a lack of drive from the legs, particularly the right leg.

Ridiculous comparison aside, I'm only using arguably the best forehand as a model because you can be pretty sure there's no major technical mistakes:

This is the shot at 3:50 in the match video that I whiffed completely.

To me it looks like I should just focus on keeping my right leg a bit out wider so I can push off it, and to not do that shoulder raising stuff. I also kinda "cartwheel" sideways a little, exaggerating the load transfer, which is perhaps not so bad for a learner, but I can't help but think it's unnecessary and just adds complexity to the shot.

If I got it all wrong then go ahead and correct me.

 

[NextLevel]

So one last time, I will be doing a blade giveaway. This will hearken back to old times, though this time, as a fix to what happened in previous times, the blades will all be quality blades. No exceptions. Unless you want to a lower quality blade... I definitely could sell them and probably should... I considered donating as well and if you win a blade and decide to donate it to any cause, that is fine. I will probably donate others.

So the desired parameters are to post a video of yourself doing two of the tricks in the old Marcos Freitas skills video. Any of them will qualify. The video must be at least 1 minute long with whatever skills you choose.

The prize blades - 2 Xiom HAL blades , 2 Andro Wosik Legacy blades, and 2 Joola Trinity Vyzaryz blades, all used or almost new but in quite playable condition and worth something reasonable. As the dictator mod, I judge the entries. I will cover postage. When you post your video of your skill and I say it qualifies, just let me know which blade you want. First 6 videos get the blades. The end date for this is August 31, 2026.

Still a few days left. Have sent out one Xiom HAL. Not sure why people are reluctant to submit entries. Maybe I should give out Butterfly blades lol...

 

[Archosaurus]

Still a few days left. Have sent out one Xiom HAL. Not sure why people are reluctant to submit entries. Maybe I should give out Butterfly blades lol...

To be fair, when all the courts are full until late into the night, it's pretty hard to do the table side bounce one.

We get maybe half an hour of "everyone has sat down already" time, so if I remember I'll film some for fun. There's no way in hell I'm able to do the catches, though.

 

[jonol]

Let me just confirm I'm understanding right. You say I started the swing from the shoulder, but I'm not so sure about that. What is pretty clear is that I end it with the shoulder. There's also for sure a lack of drive from the legs, particularly the right leg.

Ridiculous comparison aside, I'm only using arguably the best forehand as a model because you can be pretty sure there's no major technical mistakes:

This is the shot at 3:50 in the match video that I whiffed completely.
View attachment 43004
View attachment 43005

To me it looks like I should just focus on keeping my right leg a bit out wider so I can push off it, and to not do that shoulder raising stuff. I also kinda "cartwheel" sideways a little, exaggerating the load transfer, which is perhaps not so bad for a learner, but I can't help but think it's unnecessary and just adds complexity to the shot.

If I got it all wrong then go ahead and correct me

Well from the photos, you can clearly see that your swing is lifting the elbow and shoulder significantly, whereas Ma Long is keeping his shoulder/elbow aligned and rotating through the ball, rather than pushing the arm/elbow/shoulder up and forward the way you are.

This is a very limited context but at least based on this example, envisioning how the swing looks based on the 2 starting points and endpoints, they would be quite different.

Just as a disclaimer, this is also something I sometimes do and my coach corrects me on. No judgment here.

 

[Archosaurus]

Well from the photos, you can clearly see that your swing is lifting the elbow and shoulder significantly, whereas Ma Long is keeping his shoulder/elbow aligned and rotating through the ball, rather than pushing the arm/elbow/shoulder up and forward the way you are.

This is a very limited context but at least based on this example, envisioning how the swing looks based on the 2 starting points and endpoints, they would be quite different.

Just as a disclaimer, this is also something I sometimes do and my coach corrects me on. No judgment here.

It's definitely a thing, but it's a followthrough component, at least against balls which are there for the taking. If you look at the swing you'll notice I don't do it until after contact. You don't need to envision it.

That tendency messes up a lot of swings, though, if it happens during contact, which is a lot of my swings against topspin. I should fix it regardless because it's probably a symptom of something else.

 

[Takkyu_wa_inochi]

Hey Grok, can you make Ma Long look like Archosaurus ?

 

[Archosaurus]

Hey Grok, can you make Ma Long look like Archosaurus ?

I swear if I ever post video of me playing well, only good old fraud was used, but no AI.

 

[jonol]

It's definitely a thing, but it's a followthrough component, at least against balls which are there for the taking. If you look at the swing you'll notice I don't do it until after contact. You don't need to envision it.

That tendency messes up a lot of swings, though, if it happens during contact, which is a lot of my swings against topspin. I should fix it regardless because it's probably a symptom of something else.

Ah, didn't see the video. I see it was posted a bit further back.

Looks like you're opening your stance and taking the ball really late, it's almost in line with your hips. You're lifting the shot with your shoulder, instead of taking the ball earlier and hitting through it. I don't think you can get meaningful weight behind the shot when your contact point is so far back.

Taking the ball earlier means you can get a lot more momentum/speed in the swing by the time you contact the ball.

 

[Archosaurus]

Ah, didn't see the video. I see it was posted a bit further back.

Looks like you're opening your stance and taking the ball really late, it's almost in line with your hips. You're lifting the shot with your shoulder, instead of taking the ball earlier and hitting through it. I don't think you can get meaningful weight behind the shot when your contact point is so far back.

Taking the ball earlier means you can get a lot more momentum/speed in the swing by the time you contact the ball.

I think know what you mean, assuming "early" and "late" means swing timing and not fall timing.

For whatever reason I can do that against heavier backspin. I'll see if I can get my partner to chop for me and I'll film it some time.

Topspin no chance, light-ish backspin/no spin most of the time I lift it too vertical and to my side. Especially against lighter backspin.

Fundamentally I think it's a lack of leg drive, but I'll need to experiment next time.

 

[jk1980]

watching the video instilled some questions, because of the mixed "quality" of your play, @Archosaurus
So did you ever have technical training in the youth ? Some parts look like they might have been coming from past youth training while others (like timing and coordination) look so abysmal like you are only "playing" for a maximum of one year. There are techniques that look like quite decent but then they are glaring holes that one would not have i one was playing as a teen. As a very late beginner i did have "similar" holes in my technical repertoire at the beginning as well, but what is odd that at that stage i would not have tried some advanced techniques if i did not have the coordination to hit the ball yet.

The one thing that i do see with late returners to the game that probably played casually in the past is this sideways swing through on a loop where your bat will end up at your left shoulder instead of your forehead. this is killing your placement and will probably will make playing exercises with you hard for people on your level. If your horizontel right to left movement of the bat on a loop is so vast you can not properly control if you hit the opponents backhand, middle or wide backhand because depending on the splitsecond you hit the ball your ball direction changes a lot inside the hit window.

 

[kindof99]

I think know what you mean, assuming "early" and "late" means swing timing and not fall timing.

For whatever reason I can do that against heavier backspin. I'll see if I can get my partner to chop for me and I'll film it some time.

Topspin no chance, light-ish backspin/no spin most of the time I lift it too vertical and to my side. Especially against lighter backspin.

Fundamentally I think it's a lack of leg drive, but I'll need to experiment next time.

We were lost on what you were trying to improve based on your videos. No strokes is perfect, but a stroke is good if one can return with good power/spin even it doesn’t look good.

 

[blahness]

Well, here's some video. I'm the guy with the mop in the blue shirt. Yes I will cut it. Yes I am fat as fuck nowadays. People who have seen my really old videos are free to make fun of me for one (1) post.

This is after about 4 hours of drills, so we're pretty hammered, but luckily a lot of the common mistakes show up due to that. I don't think I play a lot better at peak form, though, I lose all the same, just to better players.

Testing out LAC on the forehand and I didn't feel super confident with it like I do with H3, but I like it, it's not bad. Will need to use it more for a fair evaluation. The topsheet isn't as good pretty obviously but it's a nice rubber.

Feel free to give your thoughts, I have mine but I don't want to influence what The People will say. We forgot to hit backhands but I'll see if I can't do it next week.

In the match I'm not really serving as good as I could, otherwise it'd just be a collection of receive errors, so yes I know they're mostly all light, long backspin. Feel free to talk about tactics, but I'm more interested in shot mechanics and footwork. Especially all of those net and whiff balls.

Apologies for unedited garbage, I have timestamped the starting times at least.

EDIT: No I don't know why the 2nd video has a scanline effect and is so grainy. Sorry. Will try to figure out for later.

Actually this looks pretty good already, you just gotta be aware of a few issues.

1) In general you have only 2 ways to deal with backspin, ie go all out and brute force brush the ball powerfully, or do a weak open blade angle lift. First option has too many mistakes while second option gets punished hard. I have seen a lot of people with way uglier strokes than you but they land it 90% of the time with good spin and control, and the reason for that they are more precise in their contact point and know how to work with the backspin. In your mind you need to distinguish between light and heavy backspin and which sidespin direction it is (if ball curves to your right you need to hook it a bit, if ball curves to your left you need to brush it at the back and not the right side to avoid bad contacts). Light backspin you probably can brush on the upper part of the ball but heavier backspin, if you do that at your current level you will be bound to fail. A lot of your loops are failing because you are attempting to loop heavier backspin and trying to brute force brush at the upper half of the ball without sufficient 'hit' ie solid contact to sink the ball into the sponge. Looping backspin isnt some 'magic' compared to topspin. With topspin you contact upper half of the ball and direct force forwards. With backspin you just adjust the angle, ie contact back of ball and direct force diagonally up (combination of forward and upwards). It is the tangential component of the force that causes the brushing and spin, but if you have insufficient normal force the ball just slips because of insufficient friction (remember friction is directly proportional to normal force). The heavier the backspin the more upwards you need to direct the force (it still has to have a very decent normal force component otherwise the ball will slip). You have an infinite range of adjustment and you wont be afraid to hit into the net as worst case if you hit the ball towards the ceiling it can never go into the net (extreme example to help you overcome the fear of hitting it into the net). What you are doing with brute force brushing is super prone to error and it is like contacting the absolute top of the ball against topspin, sure you get the max tangential component but the room for error is just way too small for it to work reliably. You always need a decent 'normal force' component.

2. You are using your arm to initiate the backswing which is why you always feel rushed as the arm is way slower than the body. Do not even actively move your arm during the backswing. First instinct when you see the opponent hit the ball is to drop your centre of gravity slightly so that you get potential energy into the front foot (split step), then push off the correct foot (right foot to move left, left foot to move right) to move to the correct position and rotate at the same time to get into the backswing position immediately. The body rotation already gets you in the perfect backswing position, no need to move your arm. You got way more time than you think, so dont rush the ball. I see lots of attempts to loop it super early, there is no need to do that esp on FH. Wait more. One really good way to train is to really wait till the ball is dropping and then loop it - you need to gain the confidence that even if you are super late you can always execute a good opening loop.

3) the serve and serve recovery looks ok but actually isnt because of the lack of weight transfer which makes recovery of the body too slow to deal with a random ball from the receive. Basically if you serve FH from BH corner, you need to start from weight on left foot, throw the ball with left hand using weight transfer to the right foot, and then as the ball drops you contact the ball by transferring weight into the left foot and then riding the rotation straight to the ready position which then flows to your split step. If you dont do this, you will always be rushed when they receive esp if they contact it early.

Also in general for the video against topspin it shows your imprecision. Table tennis is not as simple as see ball, rotate body and swing. It is a complex sport where incoming balls have infinite combinations of speed, spin, placement. You need to be a lot more precise adjustments than what you are doing now There were so many balls where you just kind of lazily swung at the ball not even caring where you hit the ball and where you directed the force. If you are in bad position and still go all out to loop, your error rate will increase a lot. You need to be a lot more precise in moving to the ball and contacting it at the precise, correct spot (for topspin it is generally about 45 deg ie between top and back of ball and then force has to be directed forwards). If you are not in the correct position, it is preferable to reduce the quality of your shot but then at least still land the ball. Dont just gamble, control it.

The blocker was being nice here and gave you slow high topspin balls, you havent played against some boomers who just love to block nasty to you (try left + right, short + long, fast + slow, anything from dead blocks to topspin kick blocks to chopblocks and they get a kick out of you missing lmfao)

 

[kindof99]

I can see that it’s really hard to correct someone’s strokes just from a short video. Most posts will end up with what is wrong with my Ma Long like strokes.
From my own coaching experience, people will understand much better if you can demonstrate their strokes or even hold their hands to do the strokes.

 

[Archosaurus]

@jk1980

I played a lot when I was in my teens but I'm back after 8 or so years. No training.

The timing and coordination is probably off because I'm thinking about it so much + it's 4 hours into the session and we're both pretty done. Although I will occasionally miss half-long light backspin balls in real games and just whiff it, so there's something there.

@blahness

I don't really have issues looping heavy backspin. Nothing in those videos is heavy backspin just as a calibration for what I mean. Maybe that's not the right way to think about it, though. I think often I don't really respect the spin amount on light-ish backspin. When it's heavy (chop against loop) it's at least obvious and there's less ambiguity.

In terms of serves no comment. I think I said these are nothing. I'll try to serve properly at least for a little while in the next videos. Just can't do it all video or there'll be nothing to critique.

I didn't want those kind of easy high balls, but it is what it is. My partner doesn't really know how to make a tight, low block.

@kindof99

If that's how I come across then I didn't mean to.