OOAK Table Tennis Forum

No picture, but the basic differences are that with Chinese penhold, the proper way to hold the blade is with the forefinger and thumb slightly spread on the front side to better control the racket angle (called the "wide pincer"). The blade then pivots on the fingers on the backhand which are usually curled and stacked on the index finger. This feels kind of unstable at first so takes some time to get used to.

To close the blade for a forehand, push with your thumb and loosen your index finger. To close the blade on the backhand pull with your index finger and loosen your thumb. To open the blade for an RPB, push with your thumb.

The J/K grip gives a more secure forehand as the racket angle is more locked in, but I find less wrist flexibility for serves and over the table play. The forefinger generally touches the thumb on the front side (called the "narrow pincer") and the fingers on the back are more extended and sometimes fanned on the back for stability in the forehand.

While it's possible to grip a Chinese style blade Japanese style, you lose a lot of the flexibility that way. If you fan your fingers on the back it makes it more difficult to close the blade for blocks unless you change your grip, or if you are a full-time RPB player like Wang Hao. A few (like Chiang Peng-Leung) use a wider pincer and curled fingers for his backhand with a Japanese style blade.

While it's possible to do an RPB with the Japanese/Korean penhold grip, you'll notice that no top players currently do so. It is probably partly tradition, but the longer J/K penhold blades get very head heavy with two sheets of inverted rubber on them. Also, the increased flexibility of the Chinese penhold grip allows better manipulation of racket angle.

Hope this helps from someone who has played both Japanese/Korean and Chinese style penhold.

I agree with Andrew. As for the degree of flexibility, it follows that C-pen is slightly more suitable to close-to-the-table play than J-pen (traditionally J-penners attack from medium distance). These days you'll find very few pips-out players using J-pen, because they need to stay close. On the other hand, the J-pen grip allows very accurate and fast left-side drives (playing single-sided); that will explain why some c-penners add a finger-grip to their handles (like Lee Eun Hee). I think I saw Chen Longcan with something similar. BTW, there are oval J-pen grip blades on the market, most of them ALL or ALL-. Those would be for close to the table play mainly controlling, and attacking from both wings.