OOAK Table Tennis Forum

I am now committed (as much as an EJ can be) to Nightmare anti. The title is literally true now and I hope over the next weeks/months it can become figuratively true.

I'm playing summer league and two mondays ago(9 days) I had a last straw match. I played with lightly UV'ed* new dtecs. I beat the 2 and 3 handily. The number 1 is a level or two below me in overall results but he is the type who has strong shots and might put them together at any given time. He went for his shots and made them and beat me up 3-1. That would be tolerable in general but when he looped forehand into my pips I couldn't keep it on the table. After a few I was tentative to the point of being scared of the spin.

I had the Nightmare on a backup blade in the bag so after league I grabbed another strong looper and tried it. I could easily keep the ball down, actually I had more problem adjusting and getting it over the net. I also for the first time saw the incredible reversal the Nightmare CAN produce. Following a spinny loop blocked back with the Nightmare my opponent would open the face up almost flat, lift the ball a little and still struggle to get it over.

I resolved to use the Nightmare because i really need it against loopers and assumed I would have to put up with struggling more against hitters and rollers. Of course following Murphy's law my opponents this week were to be a very strong #2 penhold smasher and a #1 who is a good standing disabled player and punches and slaps the ball around with little spin and unreadable 'strokes'.

videos of practice and matches to follow soonest

* can I admit to using treated pips in the past tense? I have zero moral compunction about violating the ittf's immoral and not objectively enforceable not-exactly-rule regulation. I do have some problem looking an actual human being in the face and telling him my obviously frictionless pips are not treated. I had been experimenting with half-treating to make life a little easier for me and still maintain plausible deniability. I also wouldn't like to be at the mercy of a tournament referee who decides he can judge legality without a friction machine.
This footnote is just for honest background. I won't respond to any 'ethical' comments and would greatly prefer not to get any.

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coming back after 2 years off
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last wednesday practice.

Boris is a few levels below me but he was solid enough to give me some excellent, much needed practice with the Nightmare while apparently being happy to practice his own strokes against reversal.

I probably need to learn to 'Solja' it more aggressively against shots like these but here I was happy just learning to get it back consistently with the anti and try to get rid of long pip reflexes.

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coming back after 2 years off
don't freaking know what I'm using from day to day!

In another un-recorded part of wed practice I found something odd and disturbing.

The nightmare seems totally unaffected by topspin.

Underspin does not grab but it does fall away into the net unless played just right. All slick anti has this weakness for me. I have a tendency to stab down at pushes which is never good and useless with the slick anti.

I found to my chagrin that a hard, sidespin serve that I blocked passively would drift off and miss the table in the direction of the spin. It doesn't feel like it grabs much, maybe the spin 'continues' and the ball moves in the air??

Next session I found I can safely return those serves by 'chopping' but I don't think that will be the most effective return in the long run.

_________________
coming back after 2 years off
don't freaking know what I'm using from day to day!

I got annihilated the first few times I used NM. You cannot play passive except against loops. A punching motion seems to work against all types of spin. I had major problems returning underspin serves "Super Block style" against a high level player. Lots of balls in the net.

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My whole set-up costs less than a sheet of Butterfly Dignics

I used Dr. Neubauer ABS for quite a while so perhaps I could give you a tip that may work with Nightmare...

When using slippery anti, you have to remember that against strong topspin drives, the incoming ball's force will sink into your anti without problem, so you can control its trajectory by feeling the impact. Against all other shots (including serves), there will be not enough force from the ball itself to sink into the rubber, unless you hit them off the bounce. Once the ball drops from its highest point you pretty much have to "chop" or stab at the ball to get enough contact area on your anti to execute your shot. This is the major difference between slick anti and frictionless long pips. The soft slippery long pips act like tentacles to envelop the ball so you can control its trajectory, even on softest pushes and spinniest serves. Unfortunately, there are no such tiny "tentacles" on any anti , so you must actively strike the ball most of the time to get enough surface area at contact to re-direct it successfully.

You have very good touch and ball control but you are extremely upright when you play. If you got in the habit of bending your back and knees and playing on the balls of your feet it would really help you game. You would especially notice the difference when you FH attack. (I am assuming you are the RH guy)

thanks for replie, guys

notbob, I'm really worried about pendulum servers who are so good I have trouble telling side-under from side-top. I can handle under that I read but ...
I'll be posting some matches very soon.

rr, I didn't realize you spent a significant amount of time with ABS. I quickly decided AntiSpecial was hopeless and never got convince ABS was worth another load of money to try. Nightmare is really two levels easier to use in my opinion. I'll keep in mind what you say next hit.

carbon, The really sad thing is that for me this is medium-good. I can actually lock my knees when I forget to work on it. I know I'm unathletic but seeing the degree of it on video is still disappointing. I just started lifting (I start a lot ) so I hope that helps. I watch myself and say to myself 'it was a smart decision to play with anti and short pips cause I never was going to blow anybody away with foot speed and power'

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coming back after 2 years off
don't freaking know what I'm using from day to day!

Fair enough but still try to work at it. A lot of it is just getting in the habit of bending down so try to keep reminding yourself. Even if you don't end up moving like Xu Xin every little bit helps (for eg - just being bent over allows your body to become part of your shots and thereby improves your strokes). If it helps at all, I usually tell students to have the stance of a gorilla.

Ok, here are mionday's league matches. It's a 4 man league but as our #1 I play the 1,2 and 3 and not the 4.

Based on experience with DrN anti and only 2 practice sessions since 'commiting' to Nightmare I expected to get annihilated (to use notbob's phrase) by the 1 and 2 and maybe even drop a game to the 3.

Here is 1 game against the 3 who really should win about 1 game in 30 against me when I'm playing with a rubber I'm used to but I was worried. Sorry about the obstruction. That drop down wall separates us from basketball and if the end of it is knocked back even six inches it opens up the angle to the table. Hard to keep track of it when I'm playing.



The Nightmare behaved itself pretty well and this was mostly beating up on a lower level player with my offense, such as it is.
I got him 3-0 for a good start to the night.

_________________
coming back after 2 years off
don't freaking know what I'm using from day to day!

i think for all kinds of underspin (lincluding side underspin), you should roll aggressively like this video (using the special Giant Guard Special)



When playing slick anti, for returing serves which i am unsure, i will position or move my bat in the mirror image of the server's bat seriving direction.

i think perhaps to make the best use of Nightmare, one should pair it with his blades. Just my 2cents

Qi is one of the top #2's who might have been a #1 if the seeder was in a different mood. He has a good game against me with a strong penhold serve and smash. Also good blocks when I try to open with my not exactly overpowering loop. On my side is he's not comfortable against 'material'. After our first practice match a few weeks ago he said in his good but heavily Chinese accented English " I am scared of your rubber." One of the more good-natured and amusing comments I've gotten.

I was afraid that with the Nightmare I'd miss or pop up enough to make up for his lack of confidence against reversal.

Sorry about one loud f-bomb when I miss a high, short gimmee to go down 7-9 rather than tie at 8-all.





Mostly ugly TT with the smasher trying to beat the disruptive player on one shot more often than not.
One thing I was really happy with was serving deep underspin to his ph bh getting a deep push and hitting it down the line with the Nightmare. Especially at the very beginning and end of the match.
I was totally thrilled to get out with a 3-1 win, as you might guess from the reaction.

_________________
coming back after 2 years off
don't freaking know what I'm using from day to day!

i think that if I push my feet a little wider then I automatically bend a little more. Does that make sense to you?

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coming back after 2 years off
don't freaking know what I'm using from day to day!

It may help to some degree but you still need to do more. Try to benz ze back and benz ze knees and have your weight forward on the balls of your feet. It will certainly feel uncomfortable at first but after a while you should get used to it and become better balanced. As I said earlier, you have good touch and ball-control and you are more than capable of making dramatic improvement. However, at present, your balance and movement is way off and it really impedes your game. If you dont mind me saying, I think you will improve much quicker if you focus more on your stance and movement than your equipment.

Mike plays amazingly well considering his handicap. He leans more heavily on his cane walking into the building than he did even a few years ago when I first met him. He's starting to play some serious regional and national standing disabled events. With his excellent hand skills, if he could move even at my lousy level I think he'd crush me. He is also a major trash talker which is why I 'cho' his errors which I don't do against most people. I give absolutely no consideration to his handicap at the table other than trying to take advantage of it whenever possible. If I try to be kind he'll definitely beat me. If I don't he still might beat me.

Mike struggles with reversal and I dominated him with old dtecs but he's so good at snapping the ball to the corners with an unreadable, unconventional motion so I have to reach and chase the ball and chop and puts so little top on his attacks that I really expected him to beat me with me using the Nightmare. I expected him to put me in positions where I just don't know how to use the anti yet and give me shots where the Nightmare doesn't reverse much.

He pops the serve deep to the corners rather than spinning it so I actually return serves to the forehand with the short pips instead of my mutant-seemiller-fast-flip-thing with the anti that I usually do (and our coach hates).







I did better scrambling with the Nightmare than I expected. Missed a few I think I would have made with lp but not a crippling number, The anti also drew more errors than I expected. The degree of reversal on light to moderate topspin is definitely not as good as old over-long dtecs or even new legal dtecs or talon. My theory is the 'disruption' comes from the amount of reversal varying between minimal and moderate depending on exactly how you hit the ball with the anti. Right now the variation is entirely accidental but it might be something I need to work on doing intentionally later.

Totally thrilled to get through my first league night with a significantly different rubber and only two session of intensive practice 3-0 in matches and 9-2 in games. Of course I didn't play the strongest players in the club or even the strongest in this summer league but I honestly thought the style matchups might be much worse with the Nightmare than with long pips.

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coming back after 2 years off
don't freaking know what I'm using from day to day!

I wouldn't have started this self-focused video-intensive thread if I wasn't ready for some critical comment. I'm under no illusions that people will watch me play and just say "wow, he's sooo good".

I have remarked to myself and others in the past that I play better when I think of myself as a short pip forehand attacker than when I think of myself as a long pip(or anti) bh blocker. Much of that is closely related to what you're telling me. The twisty thing is that to focus on being a forehand hitter I have to have confidence that the backhand block will just be there when required. Otherwise I have to focus on getting the ball back when it comes to that side.

I watched some video of Pascal Troeger who plays a similar sp/lp style to what I want to do. He is tall and bends almost horizontal. Maybe if I visualize myself as him I'll bend just about enough

Thanks very much for the extended contribution. I'm glad you think there is some real improvement to be had.

_________________
coming back after 2 years off
don't freaking know what I'm using from day to day!