OOAK Table Tennis Forum

Good job Rafa.

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Donic defplay senso
Haifu whale soft (grips-euro)
Nittaku pimplemini 1.0mm

Thanks foam.

Rafa?

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A big bag full of blades and long pimples, donuts and coffee!

I'm not foam, but apparently Rafa Nadal (tennis player, you may just have heard of him) has a list of things that he just does superstitiously because he did them when he won once.

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Retriever (sometimes golden, but often leaden)
Moderator, Inverted Retriever Technique sub-forum - http://ooakforum.com/viewforum.php?f=74

Paid my bills too. Thanks Retriever.

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A big bag full of blades and long pimples, donuts and coffee!

I've just returned from league night...the 13th week out of 15 so two more nights of hell to go.

I'm not sure what the smell of victory is like but I'll tell you what cause I smell like feces at the moment... Stinking Feces ! My shirt is all soaked up in sweat and the smells of my opponents, and instead of showering immediately to my wifes displeasure, I'm letting the odours diffuse through the house, so that I can blog out my small triumph tonight accurately.

Here's the sitch so far... I'm in a three way tie for second with a game in hand on the other two guys. Coincidentally those two guys are on the same "powerhouse" team that includes the current leader who is ahead by one match on the three of us. So its really climatic for all of us with two weeks left.

Next week its the showdown, the shootout, the duel to the death...my team faces that powerhouse team that is beating everyone, well, except for me

The head to heads are as follows:
1) Vs the leader I have a winning record of 2 : 1.
2) Vs the capt of the other team, a winning record of 2:0.
3) Vs the TOUGH guy, a tie 1:1(but I have the momentum cause I lost 1:3 then a few weeks after I beat him 3:0 and both of his team mates on the same night.)

To add to the drama one of those players complained that they were not getting the same number of matches played. In response I had to look through the schedule again(I'm the div secretary as well) and really get to the bottom of the problem... and that is that our crazy season switched from a 6 team roundrobin to a 5 team robin. One team was eliminated and the members, well only one member the capt., was switched to the team that comprises the three players mentioned above. These two teams should have played a while back but now all we have to do is to get them to replay that match. I don't think they really wanted that option but that is the correct and fair solution to their dilemma. Now, those guys might have to play themselves to sort out who will be second ha ha...irony at its best!

Well back to tonights play, I consider it the appetizer before the main course next week. I played my team mates from last year and one of them almost beat me. It went down to a nail biting 5 games with me taking it 11-8 in the fifth And then I beat his two team mates. He could have beaten me and maybe with a bit of luck should have. He is very good against pips but loses to opponents who hit and loop harder. He was the "dangerman" for me (quoting Bud Collins at Wimbledon NBC)... I would rather play the hard hitters above then this guy...The gamesmanship hedisplayed was really good too eg talking it up with compliments, sorries, calling up different scores and then back to the correct scores, stopping play a few times...i could see everything in slow mo and i just kept telling myself its all gamemanship and just to play the ball and keep it low...ball he was great at quick loops and flat hits and nailed many of my well placed chop blocks from my tsp p1r ox side...he was slow and mythodical matching me move for move...

Anyways I'll take it ugly tonite!!!!

And I'll sign off with a great song beside I am definitely overjoyed to get to next week and maintain the pressure on the leader and his teammates:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atxUuldUcfI&feature=kp[/youtube]
"Any Way You Want It"

Any way you want it
That's the way you need it
Any way you want it
She loves to laugh
She loves to sing
She does everything
She loves to move
She loves to grove
She loves the lovin' things
Ooh, all night, all night
Oh, every night
So hold tight, hold tight
Ooh, baby, hold tight
Oh, she said,

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A big bag full of blades and long pimples, donuts and coffee!

For the record, week 14 is done and over with... I'm back to blogging about my petty results in my small club's div 2 houseleague...things went well tonight...did some prep work for the three matches vs the best team on sat.night like serve receive vs the robot ...simulated serves from the big guy that I had to play...also practiced with my back up bat just in case anyone complained about the rubbers losing pips but no one checked...also mentally went each of the tough opponents that i would be facing and noted what their weaknesses were again eg the big guy has a bad short game on the fh side but a deadly bh loop...eating mcdondals late at night after winning three matces feels great...anyways here is what happened tonight...
First Match was against the tough guy and I won that 3-1...kinda of up and down but it was all about who made more errors not about his heavy serves or third ball kills...then it was a long 3-0 match versus the inverted/pips guy...he kept trying to attack instead just rallying...more errors on his part...gotta give him credit for attacking while i just played it safe...last guy was the capt and i took it 3-0...he is improving but pips is still too mysterious for him even he ripped apart the other inverted players on the other teams...

one more week to go and it will be over...unofficially I'm in the lead but we still have one more rpund and the guys i playedtoday have to play themselves next week to sort out the total number of matches while I play a team that is considered easy...anything can still happen...the guys also laugh at me for missing one of the weeks so I could have won it tonight ha ha....

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A big bag full of blades and long pimples, donuts and coffee!

Revelations revelations and more revelations… back to the main point of my blog – it’s the Fast blade not me!

I’ve been playing houseleague for two years straight, a drop in the bucket compared to most of you guys, now and I’ve tried my different setups versus a wide range of rec players, kings of the basement and what not, and a few tier 1 players… I have discovered or concluded the following points:

1) Playing defensively against anyone with less experience, was gonna say skills but its experience with correct or incorrect skills, you can use any blade or rubber, doesn’t really matter because of the experience factor, and you can use any style, for me that would be pushblocking or chopper.
2) Playing people who are at least as good as you are depends on how hard they hit the ball…if they can hit it harder than you can hold the blade, be it firewall plus or just a toxic 3, then there’s no way should be playing a pushblocker style. A strong wrist is a requirement because you have to keep the blade still.
3) That brings me to playing as a chopper against stronger players, with more skills and this makes a lot of sense. Just to draw an analogy from the pros, its very difficult to find a player who blocks up close to the table, the shots are simply to strong to block back on the table. So I totally accept playing defensively as chopper, as a more effective style in playing better opponents in general.
4) This brings me to the related equipment issues.If I play as a chopper, should I use a traditional slow blade or should I be radical and use a fast blade. I can tell you that after winning my second hl with a slow blade, that a fast blade would be my ideal choice. Now to explain my preferences. A slower blade works well against light hitting loopers – the slower blade provides the best control and you chop or block slowly and this is fine if you just want to practice and do drills were the object of the game is just to put the ball back on the table and not win the point outright. A fast blade puts more pressure on the attker especially on exchanges, where you produce a fast counter chop to their loop or hit through their backspin with the lps. A slow ball might be disturbing at first but the good attackers get use to it and what happens is that the looper takes their time and gets into position OR just winds up with a big loopy stroke and puts a lot of pace on it from the get go. Doesn’t matter if its short too, they just reach in and loop it for a winner with their body moving right over the table and finishing at the net.

4a) Forgot to mention that a fast blade makes quiker and easier active strokes, with a slight movement, which is a big plus compared to a slower blade which a small movement eg your wrist shakes from impact and the ball shoots up... the fast blade gives an easier way to keep the ball low, especially when playing at a face pace with the better players...
5) My conclusion after about 10 years playing with LP is that the best combination for me is to play with a a fast blade as a chopper, versus the better players. Yes, there might be loose balls, but that’s why its better to play as a chopper, away from the table, which offsets the loose balls that might occur at or over the table. In addition, another surprising revelation is how short pimples work so well on the fh chop, block, and push. My 802 with 1.5 sponge apparently has more spin then my inverted rubbers. It truly is a magic pip! Also, I found that I still prefer ox lp over the sponge, just for the directness of getting back a fast counter chop, that is low, and without using too much energy. The blade I’ve been told, must compensate for the weaknesses of the player…for me that means its my attacking skills that I have trouble applying during match situations, my fast blade, for the moment, its my bomb 729, compensates for my lack of strength relative to taller and stronger opponents. Its truly the blade, and a little bit of me!

(this post is dedicated to the kid who played throughout the year and gave me fits from day 1 in sept all the way to our last day today, a 6'2 17 year old looper kid from shandong when he was 6 to 11, 5 years of training as a looper and 1 finishing/polishing year, he used butterfly flared kumul??? with flextra on backhand and hurricane 3 on fh, of course he said his coach said there was "no future in pips"...i wished him well for his freshman year next year after our last session today at school...he knows "timmy" another great kid from just a year ago who got me on this great quest for blade and pips...hopefully someday in the future, I even the score with both of these great first class div 1 players who were way out of my league!!!")

edit: oh well back to the drawing board...really got to stick with one setup through the thick and the thin...the worst guy in the division put some holes in my set up and there might be too much speed even from far away...there is no one magic blade for all opponents...so its multiple choice:a)mat.pro LP/LPb)bombSP/LPc)FWInv/LPd)Tox3Inv/LPd)cos3inv/LP...

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A big bag full of blades and long pimples, donuts and coffee!