You are a good player, having a level difference between practice and competitive matches is entirely normal. You have to adapt your game to different environment, different opponents, different balls etc. Your opponents look for and target your lowest game, so how you defend against situations you are not practiced against often determines your level.
I think you want to control your results, you can't do that, you can only make or miss more shots. And that is entirely dependent on what you do to your game to adapt to new and unusual circumstances. You have done amazing work to progress as fast as you have already but I fear your obsession with results (as opposed to just trying to improve and reduce your mistakes by developing consistency under pressure) is going to keep you unhappy for a long time unless you change. While there are many things you can try, I would encourage you to work on your blocking and defensive and consistency game and to stop obsessing over the quality of the your attacks, you don't post one point where you are defending your opponents attacks well, makes me feel your focus is that you only play well when you attack. Getting free points with tricky serves, blocking opponent out of position, fishing and lobbing, tricky pushing etc. are all part of the game and important as well.
Thanks
@NextLevel , I agree, one of the things that I love about L.A vs Argentina (at least my small town) is the amount of diverse players here, pen holder, leftie, pips, antispin, or a combo of all of that, you name it.
I feel much more comfortable on fast games where the opponent attack me, if the opponent has slow peace or switch peaces, or got pips, I get crazy...
I've readed that trying to control the result isn't good, as you said, but even having the "theory" I'm very competitive / obssesive / perfectionist, I need to "trust the process" not the "result" as I readed somewhere.
Good advice on working on blocking and defensive game, in fact I used to have a solid defense until I get obsessed with backhand, thats the only thing I mainly had in mind for the last 2 years.. even if I do other exercises with my coach as well.
My coach for example, he moves the player and build the point to attack on the 5 ball, one of my mistakes is that I want to close my serve on the 3rd ball, like you said, trying to attack all the time, is crazy how my coach (or a chinese kid in the tournament) beat me only by having a great placement.
I remember last year, I was playing a tournament, and found that the opponent liked my style, he was countering everything, so at one point I found short serve underspin to the forehand was tricky for him, I did all the game, won 3-0 with a feeling of "meh I don't like to win like this..", after the game, he told me "you are very smart"
Thanks for the advice, appreciate it!
Don’t forget that 1/2 of the game is in your head. I think it sounds you already gave up. When I get agitated or disturbed I can loose to almost anybody. And when my head is on and I have a good self confidence I surprise myself. Don’t put yourself down it’s just a game. I am struggling a lot with this myself….
Cheers
L-zr
Indeed
@Lazer , I think I went obsessed trying to always be progressing, and lately I've found that you can be 2 months without "progress" until something clicks and you level up, couple of weeks after you can feel the same, and then up again.
As you said, I need to look as it is (at least for me), a hobby / game.
Cheers!
You are another person in rated games, too hesitant on strokes. Rubbers don't work well without adequate sponge engagement. There is too much focus on winning games when you should be focusing on playing the game. If you play well, victory will be natural.
@TackyForehand coudln't agree more, I feel like I have 2 players inside me. On that game I posted, I made the mistake of boosting the d90c before taking to the trash, and it was a horrible mistake, bounce was super high and I didn't had any control, but I've also didn't had time to put new rubbers before the tournament.
1890 is a strong rating, many players would be happy to be 1890, right now, that is about my current rating. A decade ago, I think it took me about 3 years to get to 1900 and about 4 to get to 2000 and I suspect it is harder now than it was when I did it 10 years ago, as I did in an environment where I could play tournaments almost every weekend. At 1800, you are a serious player, most players will have to do something to beat you.
You play really well, don't let your rating and results depress you, find what you enjoy in the sport, but it cannot be something you do not control like your rating - it has to be something about how you enjoy playing. Me nowadays, I enjoy playing controlled topspins and rallying with controlled topspins, even when it isn't always my best game, so I take more risks to play controlled topspins even when it is not what I should do. I used to be miserable about breaking 2000 because I was trying to do it because someone else did it, but what everyone told me was that I had the playing level, but not the mindset.
The main thing that helped me at that time was playing a competitive league every single week, sometimes even two leagues. When I broke 2000 in both leagues, I broke 2000 USATT about 3 months later. In the leagues, I learned to stop caring too much about the result and just to play my best game. So what you probably should look for is a situation where you can play without putting so much pressure on yourself and learn from results. Good leagues at good clubs are good practice tests, similar to taking a prep test for a standardized exam.
@NextLevel I think my biggest mistake was, last year I said "ok, I've reached 1890, next year I need to get 2000, from there, I always lost, probably due to overthinking the rating and the result, but I know there's a big difference between 1600-1900, and getting into 2000, and staying there, or like my coach says "a solid 2000).
Good advice on the style, I played on San Diego vs a pen holder that wasn't attacking like crazy, but he was super consistent and moderate attack but well placed, I think my style hasn't fully developed yet, for example I play close to the table but never tried getting back, I'm pretty new in the field so probably some years more will follow until I find myself on what I do better.
There's a league here but is like 1 hour drive, I might need to do the effort because is a good advice, thanks again!
It's good to take a step back and see TT for what it is, a fun hobby, and the competition is just that - as long as you play your shots and have fun that should be enough.
On the technical side, I feel like the tentativeness (esp on BH side) has some reasons. In training it looks good because the incoming ball is not irregular (you train a lot against simple topspin) and has decent pace, and you can borrow the speed. But that is actually deceptive to progress because similar to FH, the modern BH stroke cant be played with the arm - both backswing and forward swing needs to come a lot more from the hips and body. Right now, your upper body (looking at your core) is completely static during training. In training against topspin, this issue may not really manifest itself but in serious matches where there are a ton of irregular balls, without body involvement it is simply a bit too much work for the arm to adjust.
Great advice
@blahness yes, the only thing that I think of under pressure is about my bh stroke, wich makes it worst instead of letting my body go, I agree 100% on the irregular balls too, I'll tell my coach to do some multiball with variations so I can get more used to it.
Will focus more on using the hip too, I know one of my biggest mistakes is using way too much arm, appreciate it!
This is YOU having fun playing TT.
Everything else is of secondary importance.
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@lodro Bro you almost made me cry with that comment haha I needed to see that picture, is almost like I forgot.. THANK YOU!
