OOAK Table Tennis Forum

So, it was a pretty slow day of testing today. The umpires would bring the paddles over in what is basically a small gift bag with the player's name and information already filled out. From there, we would fill out the equipment information and do the testing. Only did about a dozen rackets today, all passed. I think all of the paddles were from Para competitors, so there were a decent amount of rackets with pips. Saw a few with Tibhar Grass D. Tec S. They all passed with no problems. Didn't see anybody using what I do. On inverted, saw some Tenergy, some Donic, some Hurricane 3, the usual types of inverted. My last shift as a volunteer is tomorrow, I'm doing it from 8:30-2 and then after I return from my post-event dinner with my in-laws. I've been told that I might get to umpire a match or two as well, which I would enjoy doing. Looking forward to the U-2250 and getting warmed up for my big events on Sunday and Monday. The leg muscle above my right knee (the leg I twisted slightly when I took the tumble yesterday) is feeling tight, so hopefully that goes away. I took a bunch of Ibuprofin to hopefully loosen it up. I imagine once I play it will get warm and loosen up 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

Oh, I forgot to mention, I did have a couple of higher level Para players come through using Gambler Outlaw as well. I wasn't expecting to see any Outlaw, but apparently both of the players that used it liked it quite a bit.

_________________
"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

Just got home from seeing the new Transformers movie. Unfortunately, the muscle on the front of my right leg, above my knee, feels even more tight than before. Every time I bend my knee, the muscle aches pretty good. That's the leg I twisted when I slipped and fell in my match yesterday. Right now I'm icing it down and bought some Ace bandages to wrap it with if it still feels lousy in the morning. This is a bit of a bummer, I rely a lot more on movement now and I need this to not be a problem.

Slightly off topic, the new Transformers movie was excellent. The best of the series in my opinion. Incredible effects, with 3-D that actually makes a difference in a good way. Also, a lot of good humor, and great cameos from John Malkovich, Ken Jeong and Alan Tudyk. If anybody out there likes action/sci-fi movies, I highly recommend seeing it in theaters in 3-D. Some great stuff. Also, they have some scenes filmed at the Milwaukee Art Museum. Of course, the scenes are set in Washington DC. Go figure.

_________________
"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

You could try Biofreeze for your muscle. Helps me when I pull one. Not going to fix the problem but may make it bearable to play the rest of the tournament. You don't need a prescription for it if you go to a chiropractor's office, just buy at the front desk .

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

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Thanks for the tip! Hopefully it doesn't come to that. I appreciate the info!

_________________
"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

Is your injury going to hurt your future events?

enjoying your blog btw

Glad that you all are enjoying this. Good morning!

I hope that it does not affect my performance. Got up this morning and it still hurts when I bend the knee. Going up and down stairs, for example, bothers me. Enough to affect my performance? I don't know. Maybe when I get warmed up and the muscle is loose it will be o.k. My guess would be that the pain will be there, but that it will not stop me from playing how I need to. Now, it's possible that as I play more matches it will get worse. That's the thing I'm concerned about. I will only have 3 matches today, so I'm sure I can get through that. But once I get into the events where I can advance out of groups tomorrow and Monday, if it gets more sore as the tournament progresses, I'll just have to fight through it. I'm going to wrap it in the Ace bandage that I bought last night, and I wear compression shorts under my athletic shorts, so hopefully that's enough to get me through without having it affect my play.

_________________
"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 a long day. Did racket testing this morning. None of the tests brought to us by the umpires as official tests failed. Did have someone come in with a couple of rackets with pips that did fail the thickness test, however. It was an older gentleman who was curious if they were legal or not. The first type of pips that he gave us to test was Tibhar Grass D. Tec S. They tested out too long. I explained to him the problems of some of the early versions of that rubber. Then he pulled out a paddle with some Xiying 979 that he claimed were relatively new. The color on them looked off, like it was old. Those pips measured even longer than the Tibhar pips. And they had absolutely no friction on them. I don't know how he got some Xiying 979 that were frictionless, but he had some. When I rubbed a ball on them, they were as slick as anti. It was weird.

I got a bit unlucky with my U-2250 group. The ratings were 2090, 2070 and 1756. The 1756 guy won the group. I played the 2090 guy first. I had my brother-in-law, sister-in-law, 7-year old nephew, wife, best friend and his wife there watching. I was way too wired up for the match, trying to be perfect with everything and got frustrated way too easily. I got whipped 3-0. Made a lot of mistakes out of frustration. Next up was 2070 guy. He was a lefty, he lost to the 1756 guy in his first match. First game he snuck past me when I missed a couple of easy shots. Second game I won at deuce. In the third game, it seemed like he was really getting into a groove and easily beat me. In the fourth, he started missing the shots that he'd been hitting, and I won at deuce again! So, on to game 5. I got off to a bad start, and this guy turned his game on and easily beat me. But at least I took it to game 5. I saw the 1756 player beat the top guy. This 1756 player was probably about 18, from Venezuela. That rating is obviously old, he has clearly received a LOT of coaching and playing with his 2100 rated brother. I lost 3-0 to him. To me, he was the toughest player I've played so far. His serves were nasty, he attacked everything without hesitation and hit a lot more than he missed, and was only mildly bothered by the pips. So, the group was a tough draw for me.

The good news is, by the end the muscle in my leg loosened up and was feeling o.k. And I look at this as a great warm-up for my main events over the next two days. Tomorrow at 9 is the U-1800 O-40 event, the one I've been targeting as the one where I have the best chance of going deep. I will be VERY disappointed if I don't make a good run in that event. At 6 in the evening is U-1950. The top guy in my group has a rating that's close to my newly adjusted rating, so I'd also like to get out of that group. Then on Monday is U-1800. I'm a little concerned about what I might encounter in that group. The #2 player is rated in the 1630s, but he's some kid from Canada and has likely been training with high rated players and therefore grossly underrated. I've been told by a few people that they've found that Canadian players at this event are generally underrated by a couple of hundred points, so I may have a very tough fight on my hands to get out of a group that I'd expected to be easier. Now that the warm-up events are over, and the volunteering is over, I am really focused on kicking some butt and maybe bringing home a title. 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

Big day for me today. My leg is feeling pretty good. Mentally, I'm probably wound too tight this morning, hopefully I will get a good warm-up in and work off some of the nervous energy. Ever since the entry form came out I've been targeting today and tomorrow as my days to really shine. At 9:00 I have U-1800 O-40. I'm only the 8th seed due to my lower pre-tournament rating, but given my new 1844 rating I'm probably one of the highest rated guys in the event. If I can get that far, in the semi-finals I would run into one of my teammates from the Rockford team tournament, the one who is rated around 1920 that beat me 3-2 in the finals of U-1800 in Wheeling. Playing all those 2100 level players yesterday was a good warm-up for today, I doubt I'll see anybody that good in this event. Later, at 6, I have U-1950. I'm the #2 guy in my round robin, but the top guy has about the same rating as my new 1844 rating, so hopefully he's not underrated and I will have a good chance at advancing. Then tomorrow at 9, U-1800 with the potentially underrated Canadian as the #2 player.

I just need to stay within myself, play my game, be smart and I think that I will do well. I have a lot of my hopes of maybe doing something special pinned on today or tomorrow. I haven't been this nervous/excited about events in a long time. It's going to be a lot of fun.

_________________
"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

Well, bitter disappointment rules the day for me here. After getting out of my U-1800 O-40 round robin (one tough match, two easy matches) I just played like garbage in the round of 16 and lost to a guy that I should never have list to. He had a different type of game. On serve, he would just give gentle topspin, low and wide to the forehand. Every time. If I looped cross court he could block or counter attack. So I decided to go down the backhand line, which made for tight shots. During the rallies he had no problems with any of my pips shots. All he did with pips shots was block and bump them back, rarely missing. He actually played to the pips, as my forehand could overpower him due to spin. All I needed to do was wait for the right ball to attack and I'd cruise to victory. Instead I kept waiting for the pips to force errors, and try to invite him to attack. This got me back on my heels and passive, just what he wanted. First game was at 6-6. I was serving and he got 2 straight points on balls that hit the net and dribbled over. That unhinged me and I lost the game. I fell behind fast in game 2. Rallied from 9-2 to 10-7 only to lose 11-7. Third game I got more active and dominated. Was using the forehand for winner after winner and I won 11-1! Fourth game I started off good and was up 7-5. Then for some reason I went back into my shell and lost 11-8. I've beaten guys much better than him at this event. I probably haven't lost to someone rated below me in about 3 tournaments. Boy I sure picked a bad time to be conservative. I've been targeting this event for months, it's going to be hard to mentally rebound for U-1950 today and the regular U-1800 tomorrow. This hurts more than any loss I've had in a long, long time.

_________________
"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 tried a sheet of the Xiying 979 last year and mine too had a very dark "blood red" color and a lack of quality that does give it a "tired" look right out of the package. As for the friction...the XY979 seems to have little friction on light touch because the pips are quite stiff and have hard tops with a thick top sheet. But when blocking hard shots close or chopping far from the table the pips bend and the friction kicks in. It seems to work OK as a chopping rubber, but overall the rubber just feels funny to me. I think this is an example of how measuring friction just by rubbing the tops of the pips may give a false indication. As for thickness, I suspect it's variation in top sheet thickness due to poor quality control--and the same for variations in friction. (That's just a guess.)

 

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Giant Dragon Kris Special : RITC 802 w/Dawei 2.2 35d fh : : Donic Blue Fire M3 2.0 black bh
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Sounds like you've had a lot on yopur plate dwruck.. doing all the testing AND playing in several events. Sounds like you're giving yourself quite some pressure too to do well.

I'm really enjoying your blog here though... it's almost like being there, hearing stories both from a player's AND from an officials

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Thanks for the encouragement Haggis, I'm glad that you are getting enjoyment out of it!

Well, after spending about an hour and a half on my own, in an isolated corner of the facility, I came back up for air. I determined that I lost because I was waiting for my opponent to make a mistake, when I should have been stepping around to loop once I knew that he would handle the pips. It's a common mistake that I make, and I need to continue to learn from it and grow my game to be more effective against that style in the future.

Had a very interesting U-1950 group. My first match was against a kid from Canada whose rating was in the 1630s. I had people tell me he was likely underrated, and they weren't kidding. He was about 10 years old and completely wiped the floor with me, something like 7, 3, 9. He was a lefty, knew how to handle pips already and could loop everything. It turns out, he won all of his matches in our group without losing a single game. So, I don't feel bad about that loss. Next up was, you guessed it, another underrated junior player, this time American and rated in the 1400s, but probably more like 1700. He struggled a lot with my pips game in the first two, and I was being more aggressive in using them for hitting. I won 11-5 in both of the first two games. I knew I needed to finish him off in the third, because once they get coached by their parent and team coach I'm in trouble. Sure enough, he got the feel of my game in the third and won 11-9, and he won the fourth 11-7. I was determined to not lose to another underrated kid today, so I switched up my stance, where I positioned myself and my serves, and it paid off. I got off to a fast start and beat him 11-7. That was a pretty satisfying win for me. Last up was the top seed, a penholder rated in the 1840s. He looked tough against the kids, and gave the Canadian kid a close set of games. When the game started, I was shocked at his lack of ability to handle pips shots. Every pips serve I gave him to his backhand he either dumped into the net or hit long. then I gave him fast pips serves down the line to his forehand, and he completely whiffed on 4 or 5 of them!!! After the second or third one, he complained to me that I wasn't throwing the ball up enough. So I gave it an exaggerated toss the next time, and he still completely whiffed on the return. To which I said to a friend who was watching "I guess it wasn't the toss". My dominance was a combination of his poor understanding of pips and some great play by me. I continued what I was doing against the previous kid, basically playing a modern defense game where I backed well off the table and gave him heavy chop all over the table, and if he looped to my forehand I would fish with sidespin or counter-loop. It allowed me to play a controlled game against attack and still attack on longer balls. My movement has gotten good enough that when they dink the ball short I can move in and push heavily into their body, which causes a lot of problems for my opponents.

Having some success at the end of the day gives me some hope that I can do well in the U-1800 tomorrow. Hopefully I don't get any more underrated kids in my round robin. My father is coming down to watch me play in a tournament for the first time and it would be really nice if I could advance out of my group. Plus, it's the last day of competition, so I want to go out with a bang.

_________________
"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

Still a good win aginst the 1840, not much about those kids tou can do except hope they continue to have a good tournament. Glad it doesn't sound like the knee was bothering you from friday when u fell. Good like tomorrow, play well, play smart.

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Omega iv pro
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Your long weekend sounds a lot better than mine

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I'm always in the dark, but the Dark sheds lights upon everything!! Beauty is only pimple deep! Beauty is in the eye of the pipholder!
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