OOAK Table Tennis Forum

Had my first session with the Pogo tonight, training and playing some games with a friend of mine who knows my game very well, who is rated just under 1000. He typically gives me a tougher game than you'd normally expect, partially because he also uses OX pips and partially because he knows what I'm going to do before I do it.

Anyway, after this session, I am VERY encouraged about the Pogo, and cannot wait to test it against the better caliber of players that I will meet at the clubs over the next two days. Here are my initial impressions:

HITTING
This rubber was outstanding for hitting with. I felt like I had pinpoint control with it and could place it exactly where I wanted, either cross-court or down the line. And I could change gears with it, sometimes doing a softer shot that lands shorter and sometimes cracking a fast, deep ball. The hits were faster than my 388D-1, and definitely much more consistent and accurate. What I will be interested to see in the next couple of days is how "funky" the hits are for the better players. But, so far, this is a huge factor in my game and one that makes me love the rubber.

CHOPPING
I felt like I had great control when chopping away from the table. He doesn't put a lot of spin on the ball but can hit it hard from time to time. While the ball didn't seem to have a ton of backspin on it, I did have very good control over where it was placed, and the faster he hit the ball, the faster it went back at him, and it was easy to keep it very low to the net. Once I play loopers with spinny shots this weekend, I'll be able to tell if it's tricky enough to use against them.

BLOCKING/CHOP-BLOCKING
This rubber was very good for blocking and chop/blocking. It seemed less sensitive to the incoming spin close to the table, and chop/blocking was a breeze. I even had a shot where he hit a smash, I chop/blocked right at the table, and got it to double bounce on his side! It seems like, on defensive shots, the harder the opponent hits the ball, the tougher the return is on them. And if they give a soft shot, it's easy to punish by hitting.

COUNTER-HITTING
I tried some counter-hits against topspin, and that was effective and more easily done as well. By just keeping the bat closed and making a small upwards motion, I put a counter-hit look on my stroke, which he would then dump into the net every time.

SERVING
As many of you know, my long pips serves are crucial to my game. I felt like I had very good touch right away on the short serves, and was able to keep them pretty low. On the all-important deep fast serves, all I can say is WOW. My fast, deep flat and topspin serves were significantly faster than with the 388D-1, and I made less mistakes. I will be very curious to see if these serves still bother my opponents as much as they did with the 388D-1. If they're just faster but not as funky, that will not be a good thing.

My overall first impressions are very encouraging. What you guys have said about it being very easy to play with and the consistency with which you're able to play were all true. I did feel a great deal of control with this rubber, especially hitting, which is a staple of my game. The true test will come over the next two days, to see if the hits, serves and chops are funky enough to bother players at and above the 1700 level. If they are, I think this rubber will find a convert in me.

_________________
"The greatest teacher, failure is"
USATT Rating: 1725
Blade: Stiga Cybershape Carbon
FH Rubber: Butterfly Tenergy 19 2.1
BH Rubber: Dr Neubauer ABS3 1.5

Looks like you found your LP replacement.

Does sound very promising dwruck! You're right though, against tougher players is the real test, so I look forward to hearing about that.

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IM STILL NOT CONVINCED!

Im using the 388d and totally love it!!!

Although i treated it and it slowed down and plays nothing like the original... Im not wondering why you dont like it.

Lol.

Wondering about your thoughts after a few sessions.

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the re-evolution of war
Bty Gergely Palio Macro Era 42.5 Max DHS H2 Max

boing boing boing... thats how pogo's go lol

It seem like a proactive type rubber

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Blade Ulmo Duality| FH Tibhar mx-p Black, Dawei 388D-1 red OX
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Rodderz, I would say to get the maximum out of this rubber, you have to be active and want to look to attack. If someone was going to play purely defensive with it and not attack, I'd say it would be better for blockers than choppers. But that's after one session.

I will be sure to give you guys another update tonight after session 2. I'm really looking forward to using this against stiffer competition and spinnier shots.

_________________
"The greatest teacher, failure is"
USATT Rating: 1725
Blade: Stiga Cybershape Carbon
FH Rubber: Butterfly Tenergy 19 2.1
BH Rubber: Dr Neubauer ABS3 1.5

Dwruck,

How does Pogo do in attacking underspin shots that are popped up a little?

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Nittaku Endless, Bomb Talent ox, Mark V 1.8

Very well. Anything popped a little can be aggressively attacked. If I take a little off the shot, I can place it almost exactly where I want. If I want to really rip it, I just go cross-court and it's not going to come back. At least in my first session, it was a dream for attacking with.

I hope in another two days I like this rubber as much as I do now. As I've said before, it definitely hits like a dream; I just hope it's tricky enough for the better players and gives enough backspin for chopping powerful loops.

_________________
"The greatest teacher, failure is"
USATT Rating: 1725
Blade: Stiga Cybershape Carbon
FH Rubber: Butterfly Tenergy 19 2.1
BH Rubber: Dr Neubauer ABS3 1.5

Here's my report from night #2:

I was disappointed in the turnout at the club, not as many of the really good players came out tonight. Hopefully a few of the guys with really good, spinny loops show up at the club tomorrow.

I did manage to get in a few matches against 1700-1800 level players, however. And I have to say, after the second night of using it, I'm leaning towards making the permanent shift.

Even though my overall game was complete garbage tonight due to my forehand being really out of sync, I was overall very happy with the Pogo.

To play this rubber, you have to play aggressively and with a very active stroke. Passive strokes don't give very good results. When chop/blocking, a very quick motion can impart a lot of backspin and take off a lot of pace. A lazy chop/block sends the ball long. When chopping away from the table, anything less than a full chop stroke dumped the ball into the net. A full, aggressive chop stroke against a good topspin will send the ball back low and hard. There were also a few times tonight when I was jammed by a good forehand attack and I got the pips on the ball but popped it up. The other players, the majority of the time, dumped their smashes into the net because of the reversal, so there is a little bit of a bail out in those situations. Even when pushing, if I made a weak stroke I'd miss, but an aggressive push could be placed in some very uncomfortable positions for my opponents, and on short underspin balls I could sideswipe with ease and even flip a couple.

Hitting with this rubber is GREAT. Other than one match where I must have missed about 10 in a row, I was far more consistent with my hitting.

It also performs better against short pips, typically a major trouble spot for me. At the club tonight was a very good lefty penholder who hits and smashes with short pips. It was nice, we got to do quite a few drills, and after a while I was actually learning how to counter hit some of his long pips hits, something I couldn't dream of doing with my other pips. I would start with a slightly closed bat, and as the ball came to me, I'd move the bat through and up as it contacted the ball (at about a 45 degree angle), and that would send back a counter-hit that was very flat and dead, that he would then mis-read a lot. This player also commented that my hits with this rubber were significantly faster and stayed lower than my 388D-1. The same with the serves, they were faster and lower, which seemed to even bother players that typically did not have trouble with that serve in the past.

Overall, I'd say the benefits are definitely better control and better attacking capabilities, with serves having a slight improvement. The only drawback I've found so far is reversal on chopping away from the table, as it doesn't seem to give as much backspin, although the returns seem lower and a little faster.

I can't wait to play with it again tomorrow; hopefully more of the same guys that I played last week will show up. This is the final exam, but so far I'd say it's passing with flying colors.

Oh, one other thing I forgot to mention. With the funky grip that I have (which many of you have noted in my videos), on typical long pips my right hand index finger ends up sitting on some of the pips. The Pogo has a pretty wide pip-free area on the bottom, wider than I've seen on any other sheet of rubber, and my finger sits flat on the blade. It gives me a little different feeling, one that I like because it feels more stable.

_________________
"The greatest teacher, failure is"
USATT Rating: 1725
Blade: Stiga Cybershape Carbon
FH Rubber: Butterfly Tenergy 19 2.1
BH Rubber: Dr Neubauer ABS3 1.5

dwruck, Glad to hear you're liking the Pogo! I concur on your observations; particularly the effectiveness of the quick chop/block, whether executed off the bounce against loops, or anywhere for that matter.

Don't forget to clean your Pogo before your next outing as I found its effects degrade noticeably when dirty. In fact, if you ever find yourself wondering why it's suddenly inconsistent, or why you can't make the shots you did previously, that's a good indicator that a pip wipe-down is in order!

I was just wondering - is Zeropong the only place you can get this? The shipping costs more than the rubber itself, for me.

Many thanks,
Canto_shmo

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' Winners never quit and quitters never win. ' Jorgen Persson

729 BOMB Penhold
FH Tenergy 05
BH Palio CK531A

I is penholder .
Chopping with SH is fun

Thanks for the reminder on the cleaning. I did wipe it down with a wet sponge at the end of the night last night, but I'll be sure to take another look at it.

As far as I know, the only place it's available from is Zeropong. It's got to be available from somewhere else, but I don't know offhand. Maybe eacheng.net?

_________________
"The greatest teacher, failure is"
USATT Rating: 1725
Blade: Stiga Cybershape Carbon
FH Rubber: Butterfly Tenergy 19 2.1
BH Rubber: Dr Neubauer ABS3 1.5

There is at least two other places.

Japsko (Sweden): http://www.japsko.com/
ttdd.de (Germany): http://www.ttdd.de/lange-noppen.html

and eBay of course!

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Capoblanco

Blade: Dotec Ovtcharov All +

FH: Friendship 802-40 2mm
BH: DMS Transformer 1mm

This will sound very bad but how do you actually BUY from japsko and ttdd.de?

Do you just have to email them?

lol thanks!

_________________
' Winners never quit and quitters never win. ' Jorgen Persson

729 BOMB Penhold
FH Tenergy 05
BH Palio CK531A

I is penholder .
Chopping with SH is fun

Yes.

_________________
Capoblanco

Blade: Dotec Ovtcharov All +

FH: Friendship 802-40 2mm
BH: DMS Transformer 1mm