Does being a coach reduce your competitiveness

[Silver smasher]

I am a local league player and a low level coach. At a recent competition I lost a match I should have won. I later realised that I was enjoying myself blocking shots back to my opponent when I should have been aggressively counter hitting to the corners.
Unlike professional players many experienced players will coach young or new players. Has spending time blocking back shots and working with lower level players adversely affected your game?
I really want to coach new players but also want to be competitive in local leagues and competitions. There are brilliant coaches on this forum who also win high level matches (Dan!) - what is the technique or mindset required to change from blocking back to playing to win?

 

[igorponger]

Real coaching is far different from a mere ball feeding. Mr. Masudzaki is intimately fostering for Mima rather than simply partnering in rallies. A good player never makes a good trainer, and vice versa.

 

[JJ Ng]

I am a local league player and a low level coach. At a recent competition I lost a match I should have won. I later realised that I was enjoying myself blocking shots back to my opponent when I should have been aggressively counter hitting to the corners.
Unlike professional players many experienced players will coach young or new players. Has spending time blocking back shots and working with lower level players adversely affected your game?
I really want to coach new players but also want to be competitive in local leagues and competitions. There are brilliant coaches on this forum who also win high level matches (Dan!) - what is the technique or mindset required to change from blocking back to playing to win?

Play matches with your students....that will get you moving.

But more seriously, are you coaching for income? I used to run unversity table tennis clubs where I coached really really novice players, like univ students who never played any ping pong before going away from home to go to college. In those instances, I just coached them to keep them interested in the sport (and the table tennis club). I did not feed them multiball for, say an hour.

If you are coaching or income, I don't think you have a choice. You have to keep on blocking to make it worthwhile for your students to improve. And yes when you are blocking you are just standing there because the lesson is, say, an hour, you are not going to be moving around all the time.

However, some students once they are advanced beginners, you can start playing matches with them. And that is appropriate. After all, they need to learn how to deal with balls coming at them at different speeds, different lenth on the table and different spins.

One coach at my club sneaked in some backhand and forehand drill for himself. Basically his excuse is that, the student needs to block top spin consistently and place the ball properly. So they are blocking the ball to the coach's FH and BH and the coach just spins really hard from both sides of the table.

In other words, you can sneak in some footwork practice for yourself. Also some of the students, when playing matches, will pop the ball up with weird spin. When you play matches with them, it is actually quite challenging to smash or loop drive those pop-up ball properly so you don't embarrass youself in front of your student!!!

 

[Tony's Table Tennis]

When coaching, you actually learn a new part of the game.
Your action - training time could be reduced, but surely your tt brain time would be increased.

It is difficult to keep the form, but if you are a fair level to start off with, the form + fitness is one thing. Blocking or attacking is another thing.
I would agree on form and fitness being affected. If you wanted to attack, that is your game IQ issue.

Maybe it could be related to your form and fitness, where you don't want to attack, but I, for example, push myself to move - even if I am late or get it off, I want to play like how I would, when I was much younger. So inside me, there is a part where I want to execute what I talk about. My form and fitness may not be there, but if I just get 1 in, that feeling is great.

I think you need to ask yourself, why you are not counter hitting.
Is it really related to the slow game in your week prior? I'm not sure how high of a level your students are, but form+fitness vs game strategy, you would need to find a balance.

Good luck

 

[IB66]

About 2 yrs ago I took the level 1 coaches course, due to covid I did the last day of the course a year late.
But for all intense and purposes I have been coaching new players, both young and old for 2 yrs.

There's a balance you need to try and achieve.

Mine is a little out at the moment!!!!

2 coaching sessions Tuesday and Friday evenings, 1st hour is for the younger new players, 2nd hour for juniors that have advanced and achieved a level where they can play, have reasonable strokes, club league players, as well as better players of a higher level.

I played matches for 3 clubs last season, so on a normal week during the league season, 2 matches.
Average 4 evenings gone a week, busy week 5 nights, Her indoors is not happy!!!

Physically, demanding, especially as my knees ain't how they used to be!!!

Match results can be up and down, and YEP sometimes coaching mode kicks in, not only too many blocks, passive play, poor quality mid table balls easy for opponent to kill off etc.

So this season, I'll reduce club matches, 1 club, regular team player, and 1 club OCCASIONAL stand in player (gotta be hard headed and refuse playing regularly!!). Mix in a few VETTS tournaments on weekends.

Get some coaching in!!! be coached, instead of coaching others, maybe once every 3 weeks. I keep this away from using a coach I coach with, (my personal preference)
You can do some regular routines, but go for irregular as well, as this is more like match play.
Also play matches against your coach now and again.
Being coached reminds you of what you should be doing and how to do it, which also helps you with how to coach!!
Ask the other coaches (unless you are coaching solo) if they need some practice, likely they may be in the same situation as yourself!!!
GO THAT EXTRA MILE TO GET GOOD QUALITY MATCH PRACTICE IN

You can try and include what you need to improve on, when you are coaching others, Can be difficult to do with new players, but is possible.
Footwork is a good one, and can be implemented during coaching. Okay, block BH all the time?? why not try BH for 5 balls, then step around and block FH for 3 balls, then back to BH etc, The way you go about coaching can be tweaked, Plus if they actually see you moving correctly (or moving at all!!!) [visual learners!!] rather than just static blocking.....??

The good thing about the sessions we run is the 2nd hour, where the players can rally reasonably well and are of a better standard, then its easier to implement stuff you need to improve yourself. 10 mins of FH topspin across the table footwork, or in and out, they can get tired, then they rest & block for 2 or 3 mins and you get your FH going!!

Get your MATCH HEAD ON, Mentally, this is important when you play matches. try and make sure you don't go into coaching mode just cos you picked up a TT bat!!!

 

[lodro]

Get your MATCH HEAD ON, Mentally, this is important when you play matches. try and make sure you don't go into coaching mode just cos you picked up a TT bat!!!

Agreed ! It is in the head.
When coaching you develop your compassion to help and teach others.
When you go for matches your attitude must be : "I am going to fu%*ck this guy. 😂