Video Footage Safe Thread

[MOG]

Should I forget about returning tricky serves and use reversed rubbers both sides like in this video.

 

[vvk1]

Which serves in this video did you find particularly tricky?

 

[NextLevel]

Which serves in this video did you find particularly tricky?

I think he is talking about his reason for using pips in the past (usually to enhance serve return) and saying he used inverted on both sides in this video and asking whether he should just do that instead.

 

[SamTheMan]

Should I forget about returning tricky serves and use reversed rubbers both sides like in this video.

Wow! Welcome back to the light!
After watching this video against this player I can’t see any reason for you to play with pips. I didn’t count, but I think you got more points on serve receive then when you served. Aggressive backhand on serve receive that put pressure on the opponent and often straight winners. I also believe you won more points with your backhand then on your forehand, so I can’t see any reason to go back to medium pips. 👏
Edit: Sorry, just realized this was the Safe thread. I thought I was responding to the chitchat thread…

 

[turbozed]

This is a BH vs a medium energy ball... and these balls are coming in kinda high.

You can always make an argument for more spin on the BH shot, but if ball is high, hitting is a good safe pressure shot.

If you are firming real hard right at impact, you are not gunna have a big follow through... but on balls with a softer grip pressure at impact, you should see you follow through be longer.

Reaching out too far to impact the ball comes from misjudging the ball arrival time or misjudging your position. You get those right, then it won't be an issue.

You do have a lot fo flippy floppy wrist going on... if you can time that well, then your shot doesn't suffer and you can get pace. Thing is, it is difficult to time that use of wrist at high power. Much easier power can come from allowing ball to come to your strike zone, use lower arm and smaller amount of wrist and firm up right at impact, use a short stroke. You will see your ball move out at a high speed and you made it look easy.

Many coaches have professional disagreements on how to respond to a ball with your BH. The high level coaches who train national level kids will nearly all say to move up, take the ball real early and do a fast loop.

I am often in major disagreement for being the only option. One can get down a little more, drop bat some more, and keep wrist loose and make a slower, high spin ball that will trouble even advanced players. Spin gives safety and it is always good to be able to spin.

Many TT players and coaches seem to think spin is some offensive 4 letter wird that starts with an S... since I do not observe so many players spinning it up and see fewer coaches teaching or advocating this.

This is very helpful.

Would the following be a good way to conceptualize the different approaches of hit versus spin (generally speaking):

1. Hitting benefits from short stroke, taking ball later, higher rate of force production, and firmer grip at impact resulting in shorter follow through and shorter contact time
2. Spinning benefits form longer stroke, starting stroke a bit earlier, distributing force through longer contact and resulting in a longer and more pronounced follow through

Should I be focusing on training the two as two distinct techniques at this point and is there one technique that I should spend more time on as a developing player?

 

[dingyibvs]

This is a BH vs a medium energy ball... and these balls are coming in kinda high.

You can always make an argument for more spin on the BH shot, but if ball is high, hitting is a good safe pressure shot.

If you are firming real hard right at impact, you are not gunna have a big follow through... but on balls with a softer grip pressure at impact, you should see you follow through be longer.

Reaching out too far to impact the ball comes from misjudging the ball arrival time or misjudging your position. You get those right, then it won't be an issue.

You do have a lot fo flippy floppy wrist going on... if you can time that well, then your shot doesn't suffer and you can get pace. Thing is, it is difficult to time that use of wrist at high power. Much easier power can come from allowing ball to come to your strike zone, use lower arm and smaller amount of wrist and firm up right at impact, use a short stroke. You will see your ball move out at a high speed and you made it look easy.

Many coaches have professional disagreements on how to respond to a ball with your BH. The high level coaches who train national level kids will nearly all say to move up, take the ball real early and do a fast loop.

I am often in major disagreement for being the only option. One can get down a little more, drop bat some more, and keep wrist loose and make a slower, high spin ball that will trouble even advanced players. Spin gives safety and it is always good to be able to spin.

Many TT players and coaches seem to think spin is some offensive 4 letter wird that starts with an S... since I do not observe so many players spinning it up and see fewer coaches teaching or advocating this.

Damn, I should've asked you to correct my BH when I played you. His form looks exactly like how mine did, and what you said re: timing, strike zone, floppy-flop wrist, etc is exactly what the coach who corrected my technique said. In fact, he had me stop using the wrist altogether in order to get the timing and strike zone down first. He had me try adding the body and footwork briefly and then stopped that as well as I just couldn't focus on so many things at once.

Even then it was hard. During the 2 hour session he stopped me probably 100+ times as I keep getting at least one of the steps wrong, e.g. 1) using wrist too much, 2) taking the ball too early, 3) didn't adjust my start position to the height of the ball, 4) didn't firm up at the right time.

I took those 4 steps to heart and went home and made it thr focus of my practice for the next 2 weeks, and I've already made loads of improvement. What was very surprising was that more than the land-rate gains I actually really gained in confidence. This is because the feeling of grabbing the ball and shooting it forward is so pronounced when I do the stroke right that I no longer wonder about what went wrong when I miss. As a consequence, I no longer feel flustered when a ball comes to my BH side, since the shot will never end with a question mark, and I just react now according to my training.

 

[turbozed]

Damn, I should've asked you to correct my BH when I played you. His form looks exactly like how mine did, and what you said re: timing, strike zone, floppy-flop wrist, etc is exactly what the coach who corrected my technique said. In fact, he had me stop using the wrist altogether in order to get the timing and strike zone down first. He had me try adding the body and footwork briefly and then stopped that as well as I just couldn't focus on so many things at once.

Even then it was hard. During the 2 hour session he stopped me probably 100+ times as I keep getting at least one of the steps wrong, e.g. 1) using wrist too much, 2) taking the ball too early, 3) didn't adjust my start position to the height of the ball, 4) didn't firm up at the right time.

I took those 4 steps to heart and went home and made it thr focus of my practice for the next 2 weeks, and I've already made loads of improvement. What was very surprising was that more than the land-rate gains I actually really gained in confidence. This is because the feeling of grabbing the ball and shooting it forward is so pronounced when I do the stroke right that I no longer wonder about what went wrong when I miss. As a consequence, I no longer feel flustered when a ball comes to my BH side, since the shot will never end with a question mark, and I just react now according to my training.

I'm not sure what the rules are about you providing advice in this thread but can you share what your approach was to fixing those technique issues?

Did you just focus on one aspect per training session, for example? Was there any specific fix that contributed more to the feeling of grabbing and controlling the ball?

 

[Der_Echte]

Thanks for the good words, Big D @dingyibvs

You may have a chance to run into me more often. If I ever show you something, run it by your coach and get more insight.

When I get back from Boston in a few days, on Fri PM and Sat AM I am going to be in the San Ramon area for a few hrs each week and prolly lead trouble making missions afterwards to TTA, Pong Planet, Pleasanton, ICC, etc with any friends willing to come and put up with me.

If this works out, it will be a regular thing, if not, I still plan on 2x a month trouble making trips to bay area clubs on weekends to cause trouble with friends.

I would agree with your coach's approach and process... clearly identify things, understand what is needed, break it down in simple matters, isolate things, work with progression to a goal of combat speed combat form.

The BH can be both simple and complicated. It makes sense to not use wrist at first, even if the success of the shot fully depends on a certain amount of wrist in a certain way with a certain timing and explosion... but trying to get all that correct with all the other things that need to go right, well that is asking too much for nearly all adults and it leads to incomplete learning and failure.

I guess that (not getting complete effectiveness or enough efficiency) would ensure a job security for a coach, but I would feel terrible rolling like that. I would think your coach feels similar. There are not many effective coaches for adult learners out there, you found a good one and you know how to measure.

There are so many BH shots with so many different ways to hit them with their own nuances that it would be both impractical and counter-productive to get players to do learn too many of them at the same time. Our adult minds just do not function in a way to do that so much... but when a lot of the fundamentals get there, the development of the other BHs can be faster.

 

[dingyibvs]

@turbozed I can't comment on your technique in this thread, I'll PM you the specifics but what @Der_Echte said in the post above mine gives a good overview.

For us adults, it's just too easy to swing around a 200 gram racket to hit a 3 gram ball very fast. Developing the right technique can be very hard!

 

[Der_Echte]

This is very helpful.

Would the following be a good way to conceptualize the different approaches of hit versus spin (generally speaking):

1. Hitting benefits from short stroke, taking ball later, higher rate of force production, and firmer grip at impact resulting in shorter follow through and shorter contact time
2. Spinning benefits form longer stroke, starting stroke a bit earlier, distributing force through longer contact and resulting in a longer and more pronounced follow through

Should I be focusing on training the two as two distinct techniques at this point and is there one technique that I should spend more time on as a developing player?

Hi @turbozed

So many different BH shots with their own challenges and effective ways to hit them. No single situation dictates a singular response.

Even though hitting can benefit from a big firming at impact, their can also be hitting with less grip... sometimes like when ball got too low and you selected to commit to a hit... slowing down power a little and loosening grip some keeps it on the table with pressure if placement is good enough.

In general, hitter or those selecting a hit will strike ball on rise early or top of bounce. It is more difficult to hit when ball was high, like eye height and ball is falling... more difficult timing, ball is now further from net and vertical angles reduced... more distance means opponent has more time and space...

Strokes do not have to be a mile long to spin... one can produce boatloads of spin with a compact stroke.

Generating spin is about timing and grip control with bat speed striking ball with less solid impact, or on loop drives, solid impact off center some with another kind of grip - firming... OH... and a FAST bat speed by time of impact. I kinda already said it, but faster bat speed makes more spin potentially.

Hitting and spinning are two different strikes for sure... and one could argue there are many different kind of strikes for each.

It is difficult for adults to do too much on the BH too early when learning. Might be better to isolate and work in sequence... but some can develop both at the same time if they understand the nuances and biomechanics...

So there isn't a simple or singular answer to your very good question, you would have the best way to know what it is until an effective coach sees enough of you.

... and even then, two different coaches can have strong disagreements on how to develop and still have their player develop.

That is the beauty of TT not having a one size fits all answer to everything.

 

[Der_Echte]

@turbozed ask @dingyibvs in your PM exactly how his coach broke down the biomechanics of the shot and the key points...

... like how he made a training plan for Big D to get there, especially how he isolated things (like use little to no wirst at first to develop the more important thing - achieve consistent timing of impact to the strike point in the middle of strike zone with leverage.... and other big things like how to make the bat go fast without huge swing... how to control and time grip.

These are the kind of golden things that make development faster and more efficient.

Adult learners get caught up trying to get perfect or effective technique by trying to perform all important steps at the same time... that makes it real hard for an adult learner to get there. Much easier to isolate, fix, then re-integrate.

 

[Der_Echte]

He had me try adding the body and footwork briefly and then stopped that as well as I just couldn't focus on so many things at once.

Yes, Genau. This is EXACTLY what I say about adult learners needing to not perform all key steps at once and isolate, improve, re-integrate. It is so difficult for adult learners to do everything at once in the development phases...

@dingyibvs coach did a really good move to remove those steps from the early phases of learning the basic BH topspin. What he did should really speed up Big D's BH development.

Also he talked about CONFIDENCE, which is seeing the ball land and you KNOW you can do it again.

 

[Gozo]

Hi all, it has been sometime since I post any recent video.

This is my latest FH practice using rebounding board. I have stopped taking coaching three months now. Has my stroke deteriorated? Pls comment away. Thanks.

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

Hi all, it has been sometime since I post any recent video.

This is my latest FH practice using rebounding board. I have stopped taking coaching three months now. Has my stroke deteriorated? Pls comment away. Thanks.

View attachment 27451

Even though this is a rebound board so it does not show a FH in response to a real circumstance, something I notice is, your feet are much better than they used to be while you are hitting the FHs.

Something I also notice on the serve practice, you don't move your feet. Your right foot starts behind your left foot. And when the serve is done, your feet have not changed. If the right foot is still behind the left foot after the serve, then you can't use the body (weight transfer and core rotation) to help the serve, and you can't really be ready for the return.

Even if it is just practice, when you finish the serve, part of the followthrough should be to swing that right foot over so you are squared to the table and ready for the return.

The first person is just practicing:

Even while practicing, he practices the followthrough which ends up leaving him ready to return service.

Here is Ma Long in a match:

Your serve will be better and your readiness for the return will be better if you practice the followthrough when you practice your serve.

Still, your serves have gotten much better as well.

 

[NextLevel]

Carl giving Gozo credit for the work of Tenergy and Dignics 05. I love it.

 

[Der_Echte]

Hi Gozo,

Of course a developmental coach would like to see, even in an alone practice, such a coach would like to see a form more closely related to what you would use in combat...

... that means you get your waist down some, bend knees some, push off with right leg some, etc. move your feet...

You are not showing much of this, so it is hard for a coach to discern the combat dynamics of your stance, movement, setting of position, generation of force, delivery of force to ball, and movement back to ready stance/position to do another shot.

You are in this vid pretty much using your arm with a little starting of kinetic energy with some of your body.

That will get the job done for this situation of hitting a ball to return board and getting it back on the table...

This still has some value. Here are some things this kind of practice can be good for.

- You are practicing adjusting to the ball (eg maybe position not perfect or timing to impact not perfect). You are making adjustment to get the ball back on the table... and maybe now or later adjusting when everything is not perfect so you can get ENOUGH quality on the ball. Regardless of what conventional coach may say about a player needing to practice perfect form, perfect power generation and delivery to the ball, it is a fact we do not make a perfect position timing or stroke... so we have to figure out how to get the ball back with as much quality and consistency that we can dare in such a situation... this is important to be able to do and I may disagree with a lot of coaches even talking about it.

- It practices getting the ball to your strike zone. (you are not moving that much) it practices your patience if you are already in position to NOT strike the ball early. it is SO IMPORTANT to get the ball into the effective strike zone and that your body has positional leverage to use effective shot biomechanics. This cannot be practiced enough. The better we get at this, the better player we become. I do not think I will find a coach who would disagree with that.

- It practices prioritizing consistency over big power in your developmental journey of building strokes to effective usefulness and danger to your opponents. This is a very well accepted approach to developing by many many coaches.

 

[omelet]

First time really practicing footwork. Video is at 60 fps so slowed to .25x is best means to see the details.

Any comments?

I still feel like I use too much shoulder for my loop-drives, and should lean forward in my loops a bit but ?? Sometimes I also feel like I revert to old habit of my arm leads my legs/hips rather than vice-versa.

Does anyone have a free resource for TT footwork in detail? It seems trying to figure footwork on my own, a little hop between shots has to be done to be in the best position for the next shot but I am not sure I am doing it right.

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

Carl giving Gozo credit for the work of Tenergy and Dignics 05. I love it.

The serves used to be totally flat though.

 

[Gozo]

Hi Gozo,

Of course a developmental coach would like to see, even in an alone practice, such a coach would like to see a form more closely related to what you would use in combat...

... that means you get your waist down some, bend knees some, push off with right leg some, etc. move your feet...

You are not showing much of this, so it is hard for a coach to discern the combat dynamics of your stance, movement, setting of position, generation of force, delivery of force to ball, and movement back to ready stance/position to do another shot.

You are in this vid pretty much using your arm with a little starting of kinetic energy with some of your body.

That will get the job done for this situation of hitting a ball to return board and getting it back on the table...

This still has some value. Here are some things this kind of practice can be good for.

- You are practicing adjusting to the ball (eg maybe position not perfect or timing to impact not perfect). You are making adjustment to get the ball back on the table... and maybe now or later adjusting when everything is not perfect so you can get ENOUGH quality on the ball. Regardless of what conventional coach may say about a player needing to practice perfect form, perfect power generation and delivery to the ball, it is a fact we do not make a perfect position timing or stroke... so we have to figure out how to get the ball back with as much quality and consistency that we can dare in such a situation... this is important to be able to do and I may disagree with a lot of coaches even talking about it.

- It practices getting the ball to your strike zone. (you are not moving that much) it practices your patience if you are already in position to NOT strike the ball early. it is SO IMPORTANT to get the ball into the effective strike zone and that your body has positional leverage to use effective shot biomechanics. This cannot be practiced enough. The better we get at this, the better player we become. I do not think I will find a coach who would disagree with that.

- It practices prioritizing consistency over big power in your developmental journey of building strokes to effective usefulness and danger to your opponents. This is a very well accepted approach to developing by many many coaches.

Thanks Der.
I wish to make some statement for those who have never try rebounding board. Rebounding board is not human, you have to do some adjustment. I cannot spin too much nor hit too hard ( which I truly like ). You just have to topspin "just right" as to prevent the ball from overshooting the table when it comes back. That is why in the video, you will see I am playing more placidly and not overly aggressive. Also, in my mind during the practice, I pictured myself to be quite knee bended. I am surprise in the vid, it seems I am rather standing straight. Mind do play tricks on oneself.


Carl,
Yeah, you are right, I was in a practice mindset and completely overlook the 'get into the ready position after serve part'. My bad. Will remember your reminder, thanks.

 

[Gozo]

Carl giving Gozo credit for the work of Tenergy and Dignics 05. I love it.

vestis virum facit: It is the clothe that maketh a man.

In this case, it is the rubber than maketh the player.