OOAK Table Tennis Forum

Yeah, it's quite large. There is plenty of room around each table, and literally thousands of barriers. There's also room for a large control desk and a large area in the middle for a number of vendors to set up tables.

We're still not sure where the racket testing station is going to be set up. The machine makes a LOUD beeping noise when you turn it on and off. I'd love to know why they had to make it do that. This is a machine intended to be used at tournaments, in theory the best place is at the main control desk in the playing area. But when you turn it on there's a single loud, high pitched beep, and when you turn it off, it gives FIVE, yes FIVE, loud, high pitched beeps. So, having it anywhere near where people are playing matches is not going to work. So, we will either be in a corner of the hall that is by the practice tables, or outside of the playing hall, by the registration desk.

I'll be sure to fill you guys in on the types of things we see when I'm working the table over the next three days. Can't wait to get going with the events later today!

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"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

http://www.midwestairlinescenter.com/ca ... inescenter

Here's a link to the website for the venue where the U.S. Open is being played.

_________________
"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

I think the USATT (or more likely it's the sponsor who owns them) may sell these tables for a steeply discounted price after the event. For USA players it can be a great deal for a very good table. We had the US Open in Charlotte, NC, about 6 years ago and our club stocked up on 12 of the best Butterfly tables you can get. We are still using them for club play and they are still in very good condition. I imagine the shipping out of the USA would be prohibitive, but anyone interested should contact the US Open organizers.

 

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Giant Dragon Kris Special : RITC 802 w/Dawei 2.2 35d fh : : Donic Blue Fire M3 2.0 black bh
Member of Charlotte Table Tennis Club, Charlotte, North Carolina, USA
Visit Charlotte Table Tennis Club on Facebook

Thanks for the updates Doug, it is all v. interesting!

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Think, before you drink, before you write!

At that price i would want shares in the car park !

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Think, before you drink, before you write!

All testing today is voluntary. Had some players come through already, including a guy with some Tibhar D Tec S. So far everything has passed, nothing has even been close to failing. Got mine tested. Actually, the Talon tested thicker than the Tibhar. And my Palio Macro ERA was close to the thickness limit too.

_________________
"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

Holy cow, we just had one that went up to over 100 that made the machine beep like crazy. The paddle stunk too. The guy claimed it was his son's backup racket. I think I'm still feeling a little high from the fumes!

_________________
"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

What an incredible first day. One event and I've already been involved in two epic matches. My first match was against a double inverted player rated in the 1870s. I've played him in the past, but not within the last year. He doesn't like pips very much, but he does have a good attack and defends very well too. In the first game, it became apparent that he was afraid of attacking my pips shots, so I was able to control the points and win easily. Second game was more of the same, he played very conservatively and let me attack. He started moving me around a lot with dead balls deep, which I tried looping and kept missing. I lost that game at deuce. The third game I made a LOT of unforced errors, trying to overhit with the forehand, because he was getting my attacks back. Lost that game 11-7. In the fourth, I started giving him more conservative attacks with my forehand with a lot of sidespin that were effective. And a couple of pips hits that worked really well too. It was 9-9 when I was backing up to chop an attack of his, and my left foot slipped out from under me and my right leg went underneath me. I was down 10-9 now and had to hope I wasn't injured. Luckily, I was able to walk it off and compose myself. I got it to deuce, and eventually won! In the fifth game, I learned from past mistakes, where I'd won fourth games at deuce but gotten off to poor starts in game 5. I took extra time, got plenty of fluids, got advice from a friend, and was able to catch my breath. I got off to a 7-1 start as he continued to get more tentative and won the match!

Epic match #2 was against the top seed, rated 2000. He had a weird style, double inverted, with very spinny serves. During the points, he preferred to give really heavy pushes and block attacks. I won the first game 11-7. He made some adjustments and forced me into some misses in game 2 and beat me 11-7. Game 3 I moved him around more and attacked more of his pushes with my forehand with slow, spinny loops. I took it 11-7. In the fourth, I missed some of those loops early, and he came out with a wicked tomahawk serve really wide to my forehand that was getting him points. He creamed me 11-3. The fifth game started out poorly for me as well. I fell into a 5-1 hole and at the switch of ends I called a timeout. After that point, I decided to slide over as far as I needed to in order to return his serves with my pips, even if they were wide to the forehand side. That seemed to work, and I was able to go on a big 9-2 run to have three match points at 10-7! I used a serve that had gotten me two easy points during the run, which he adjusted to and killed right into my cross-over point. At 10-8, I missed a hit with my pips (I was out of position and just should have pushed) and he made a tough kill shot at 10-9 to send it to deuce. After a couple more deuces, I missed my serve long and he won the match on his serve. So, I almost had another win over a 2000 player, but came up just slightly short.

The fourth seed in our group was a young girl rated in the 1570s. She was underrated, and had taken the #2 seed to a fifth game before losing. I was fortunate to win the first two games 11-9 thanks to some tricky serves and pips defense, and easily won the third game 11-5.

Overall, a very exciting first day of competition that was a LOT of fun. I was quite pleased with how I played, I have now had a chance to get used to the playing conditions in the hall, and I feel very confident that I can do well in subsequent events.

The last four tournament matches that I've lost have all been to players rated 1900 and above, and all in a 5th game. I've also won some tough 5 game matches. I may not win first place in an event at the U.S. Open, but if someone's going to beat me, they're going to have to earn it.

Tomorrow is just racket testing for me. My next event is U-2250 on Saturday at 3. Some of my in-laws are coming to watch me play. I'll be up against two players in the upper 2000s and a 1750s player, so I will have to do well to not look lame in front of them. Hopefully having them there to watch doesn't make me too self-conscious and nervous, especially against that competition. On Monday for my last event, the U-1800, my dad is coming down to watch, which will be neat, as he's never seen me play in a tournament. He and I played in my grandparents' basement when I was quite young, just basement-level play, but it gave me the itch to get serious about the game many years later. So, I'd love to do well in front of him.

I'll need to recuperate my energy tomorrow. From Saturday at 3 through Monday I will be playing 4 events, 3 of which I have a realistic chance of advancing out of. It's going to be a lot of fun, I can't wait!

_________________
"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

That's great Dwruck!! I have enjoyed your blog so far and only wish I were there playing as well ... You mentioned that testing today was voluntary, why did that guy test after gluing with VOC glue?? He had to of known it wouldn't pass.

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"Success is on the same road as failure; success is just a little farther down the road."

Donic Defplay Senso | Yasaka Mark V 2.0 | SL Dornenglanz OX

Donic Defplay Senso | Butterfly Sriver | Testing

great playing Doug. see you are at another all time high today then also. Keep up the good work and playing.

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Omega iv pro
Butterfly super anti special
Blades by Charlie
Tri-carbon HAMMER

Great stuff dwruck!

You should have a more accurate idea of your own level too now...

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OOAK Table Tennis Shop | Re-Impact Blades | Butterfly Table Tennis bats
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Did that upset the machine at all? Was the next reading normal again, or did it take a while to re-calibrate?

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OOAK Table Tennis Shop | Re-Impact Blades | Butterfly Table Tennis bats
Setup1: Re-Impact Smart, Viper OX, Victas VS 401 Setup2: Re-Impact Barath, Dtecs OX, TSP Triple Spin Chop 1.0mm Setup3: Re-Impact Dark Knight, Hellfire OX, 999 Turbo
Recent Articles: Butterfly Tenergy Alternatives | Tenergy Rubbers Compared | Re-Impact User Guide

Did you test Amelie Solja's racket? You're in a good position to verify what equipment some of these good players use.

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

I don't know why that guy would have had his racket tested. Maybe he figured it would be illegal, but just wanted to be sure. Maybe he was hoping for a miracle.

The Rae machine was able to reset itself right away. There really isn't a delay at all. We leave it plugged in the whole time, so there's no turning it off and on and having to hear the annoying loud beeping noise.

I don't remember if I mentioned it or not, but the racket testing is located OUTSIDE of the playing hall, due to the loud noise it can give off. They need to fix that, it really should be at the control desk. If there's a problem and we need to give a racket to an umpire, it will be a huge time waste.

On day 1, everything went smoothly. Hopefully everything continues to run smoothly throughout the tournament.

Three of the best Canadian players came over for voluntary testing, I know a couple of them used Tenergy, don't remember about the other player. Had a couple of pips players, including a young girl (I'd guess 14 maybe) who used Dawei 388 C-1 on the red and Dawei Saviga V on the black. Had a couple of pips players that used the Tibhar Grass D Tec S. Both of those players had the pips pass easily.

One interesting thing that one of the umpires showed me is the way that they determine if there's enough friction on the pips. It was a small pocket-sized thing that he had. When he flipped it open, there were small samples of four different levels of pip "friction". One was labeled as frictionless, one was labeled as poor friction (and not acceptable), one was labeled as "good" and one was labeled as "very good". Each pip sample was just a small square, and you had no idea what the brand was of each one. They were just on there to be able to use to compare the feel. So, what he did was take a ball and lightly rub it across my pips. Then he took the same ball and lightly rubbed it across each of the four small squares, in order to compare the feel of the friction. he determined that the Dragon Talon most closely resembled the "very good" friction sample so they were o.k. It just seems like an extremely subjective way of determining the legality of the friction level of pips, but I suppose that's the best thing that most tournaments can have right now. When I rubbed the ball across the four small samples, I could definitely tell a difference, so maybe in most cases it is sufficient.

Anyway, gotta get ready for a day of racket testing. My wife is working as a greeter early this afternoon. Since neither of us has a shift tonight and I don't play at all, I'm taking her to see Transformers 3 in 3-D (we are both fans of the series). I figured that since she's not a table tennis player but is nice enough to volunteer, I can take her to dinner and do something fun that she enjoys as a treat.

After a good night's rest, I am still very encouraged by my results from yesterday and am looking forward to more competition, starting on Saturday afternoon with the U-2250!

_________________
"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

Drive on, Pips Warrior.

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Aurus Soft / Gambler GXL .6 sponge

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