OOAK Table Tennis Forum

How is your practice with the Ipong working out, and has the jamming been resolved?

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Butterfly French Style
2x Friendship 729 Super FX

Hi John,
And thanks for reminding me that I have a blog here! I need to get back on this.

to answer your question, i ended up upgrading to another robot.
I ended up buying a real robot from a fellow OOAK member, Nathanso. I absolutely love it! It can produce any shot I need really....except a very fast topspin from off the table (The robot is affixed to the table).

The praktissmate has already improved my game tremendously.

The IPong is an okay setup for topspin, and the jamming is tolerable so long as you don't mind stopping every now and then. I'll probably be selling it soon. A more motivated person may be able to really deal with the jamming, I think it would be easy to fix, but I just don't have the time.

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

Projects: Player Equipment Grid ⇝ Comprehensive Thin Inverted Chopping Rubbers Grid ⇝ Please send me corrections or new submissions

Japsican...Well done & here is yet another welcome to the Dark Side from a very satisfied LPipper.

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Setup 1: Blade: TSP Trinity Carbon | Joola Golden Tango black 1.8mm FH & Tibhar Grass D.TecS acid green OX BH
Setup 2: Setup 2: Blade: TSP Trinity Carbon | Joola Golden Tango PS black 2.00mm FH & Tibhar Grass D.TecS red OX BH
Setup 3: Blade: TSP Trinity Carbon | Joola Golden Tango black 1.8mm FH & Spinlord Gigant anti-spin red BH
See the ball, be the ball...

Thanks Gollum!

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

Projects: Player Equipment Grid ⇝ Comprehensive Thin Inverted Chopping Rubbers Grid ⇝ Please send me corrections or new submissions

Forcing A Style
My coach and I have trained Modern D, as he is a 2600 level chopper who plays that style, but even he is starting to see that we are simply attempting to shoe horn that style in to my game. Modern D just isn’t a perfect fit. He finally decided that we should focus on Defense more, and I should chop more on my forehand, which was underdeveloped stroke for me 2 months ago. Not surprisingly, he has noticed that I am much more successful and consistent (particularly against higher-rated players) playing solely defense. Since then, chopping on my forehand has come very naturally with coaching, and I’ve developed a sidespin chop much, a poor man’s version of Chtchetinine’s stroke, which encourages slow loops to my backhand P-1R. I am much better now that I’m not worried about trying to set up topspin attacks. Maybe this has been what’s been holding me back in tournament play?

Classic D?
So, I have begun my transition towards more of a Classic Defense chopper style of play. I have always been one to reserve attack for very sure things, and find that my temperament is one that prefers aggressive pushes and chops opting to play back spin and block, with a very occasional smash. My looping has greatly improved, with coaching and with Tenergy 05. We have worked on footwork for attack, and timing for it. However, when I play, despite having the ability, I opt for other methods of play. When I force the issue of attack, it’s been fruitful, but again it’s just not in my character. I prefer to frustrate attackers with returns rather than scoring winners. Don’t get me wrong, if the opportunity to attack is there I’ll take it, but it has to be the most obvious attackable ball for me to do so..and even when I do attack it’s typically with my LPs rather than my forehand. I find I’ve always been like this in every sport I play (Defender in Hockey, Corner back in Football, etc).

Equipment
Equipment-wise, I have since been naturally gravitating to thin sponged inverted rubbers for my FH, and am in the process of shopping for a suitable rubber. I have Reflectoid in 1.5, but in the wrong color and have ordered 1.0mm in the correct color. I have a thread going inquiring about this here: viewtopic.php?f=44&t=27328
I am looking at Reflectoid 1.0 and 1.5, TSP Triple Spin chop 1.0, and BTY Tackiness Chop.
One thing, I would like to get a role call of any classic defensive players. Sound off so I know who to bounce ideas off of!

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

Projects: Player Equipment Grid ⇝ Comprehensive Thin Inverted Chopping Rubbers Grid ⇝ Please send me corrections or new submissions

So....Just days after I posted that last post, where I started dedicating myself to defensive chopping prowess, I discovered that I have a very consistent and deadly (for my level) backhand pips hit. I suspect I developed it when experimenting with Talon. With Talon, I felt I had to brush more than flat hit to get the ball on the table more. When it landed it was successful, but I missed that shot maybe 40% of the time. Attacking topspin was near impossible. I trained and trained attacking with the pips to no avail.

Fast forward to today, I had gone back to P-1R and classic defense. Didn’t even try attacking unless it was high underspin.

But then I played a guy (300 points above me) that was feeding me lots of underspin. I couldn't help myself; I blasted everyone one of those shots right by him! He then changed his tactics and started to feed me no spin and topspin in order to avoid the hits. But too late, something changed...the offensive switch had already flipped. I now had it in my head that anything above the net was going to get smacked by my backhand as they were virtually unreturnable.

What happened? Where was my claissical defense? For the rest of the day I had been smashing, flipping, and hitting with the pips, particularly against those troublesome no-spin soft players. No problems handling them that day. I was undefeated.

So, now I’m wanting to explore hitting a bit more, and while P-1R is decent at attacking it’s not really a hitting LP. So what is? I know Nathanso a hitter and he uses 755 and Code. Guess what: I had an old sheet of 755 1.0mm on my older penhold racket. It was my first LP.

The next day, I slapped the 755 on the Aurora, and tried it out at the club. (looked ridiculous as it was WAY too small for the headsize) I figured it would be fun to see the difference and I would keep to my promise and go back to my dedicated chopping style and racket with the Defplay Senso. HOLY CRAP was the 755 fast and deadly on the hits! Very controlled, way more consistent than either P-1R or Talon on OFFENSE. Very little deception, but I was straight up bullying people.

Only problem I had was on chop-blocks and returning heavy underspin serves. I netted more than I do with P-1R, which is a pretty grippy pip. I then tried lifting the serves and netted those as well. This will take some practice. But suddenly I was an offensive juggernaut.
I made a promise to myself not to change, but it’s certainly fun to experiment. I may do what everyone tells me NOT do and have 2 setups for a short time to see where this takes me. But wow was I more effective.

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

Projects: Player Equipment Grid ⇝ Comprehensive Thin Inverted Chopping Rubbers Grid ⇝ Please send me corrections or new submissions

Why change a winning setup? You smacked everything on the table with P1-R. Why not work on your consistency instead?

Good advice, and true. Perhaps it's because I had even better results with the Aurora/755 setup. Nothing's permanent, and the problem is that I have 2 styles that I toggle back and forth with: one is a chopper, and the other is similar in style to Jim Weiland where I do a lot of inverted blocking and mix in LP play for variety. I think I use my pips a bit more than he does, and play a bit more defense (based on his videos). This style has given me the most success so far, but the lure to chopping was too great and went back, even though i wasn't as effective as a chopper, I was getting a better workout and having more fun.

However, with the hitting being incorporated in to my game, that has changed. I find them equally as fun and satisfying. So...not sure.

_________________
Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

Projects: Player Equipment Grid ⇝ Comprehensive Thin Inverted Chopping Rubbers Grid ⇝ Please send me corrections or new submissions

Today I should be getting my new sheet of 755 1.0mm sponge in. Finally my blade will have a rubber sheet that actually fits the size of the head of the blade. Currently the Aurora has about a 1/2" of open blade around the sheet. Very classy.

I am really enjoying hitting with the 755, but the chops aren’t as good, and neither is the blocking, in that sponge size, however the trade offs are worth it so far. The sponge is a bit bouncy...I get a lot less feedback on strokes. I just need more time with it. Lorre’s advice of sticking with the P-1R and just attacking more is a good one, but I have literally jumped up about 100 points in the club since the switch and attacking more the pips. In addition to bating people I haven't beat before, I tend to be more consistent against lower competition, which the chopping doesn't afford me for some reason. (I'm sure it's psychological).

I am really enjoying this change so far. I will not say that it is a forever thing, but definitely something I’m exploring. If I feel the 1.0mm isn’t working this weekend, I can either move to 755 0.6mm, or POGO ox/0.6mm. I really like POGO.

I am not noticing a serious drop off in performance when I do switch back to classic d using the defplay and P-1R, so hopefully this EJing and style exploration isn’t setting me back too far.

I’ll probably have more to say about this after this weekend’s league sessions.

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

Projects: Player Equipment Grid ⇝ Comprehensive Thin Inverted Chopping Rubbers Grid ⇝ Please send me corrections or new submissions

There's a difference between a red and black 755. I felt it myself while doing a rub test. The black one is grippier.

You made a great jump because not many people are accustomed to LP attacks. After a certain level that style is the hardest to be succesful with.

I'd say: if you need to choose between different styles, see what you're naturally are inclined to do and choose gears appropiately. I have an older gent I'm teaching a bit: he has a hitting style. When I learned him the loop, he wanted to be a looper. Needless to say he wasn't very good at it and his progress stagnated. Now I'm back teaching him hitting/blocking: a core style. Once he learned the core he can loop as a second/additional weapon.

Yeah, thanks for the advice. It's much appreciated! The EJ'ing this time is different because it's driven by a conflict between styles that I'm wanting to play, as opposed to playing the same style, but choosing different equipment to see if it's better.

I think I'm favoring a more allaround pip play... some blocking/chop-blocking/chopping, but centered around hitting and fast placement. Think Haruna Fukuoka, but a little more aggressive (Much to my detriment at this point, I'm sure)



What do you mean by this? Do you mean there's a low ceiling? Or that it's hard to master?

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

Projects: Player Equipment Grid ⇝ Comprehensive Thin Inverted Chopping Rubbers Grid ⇝ Please send me corrections or new submissions

The first one, although I don't believe styles have ceilings. It's just really hard to execute the style past a certain level because you don't have topspin to let the ball dip to the table, i.e. your bat angle needs to be spot on.

Well, there are pro LP/MP hitters out there, but I'm not planning on SOLELY hitting, it would be a combination of blocking, chop blocking, chopping, punching and hitting, with hitting and punching being the emphasis.

Haruna Fukuoka is a good example of what I'd like to try....there are LP hitters on the board, I'd certainly like to hear from them on this.

Lorre, your comments are appreciated...makes me think I'm making a bad decision, but appreciated nevertheless. Maybe I should explore SP/MP instead?

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

Projects: Player Equipment Grid ⇝ Comprehensive Thin Inverted Chopping Rubbers Grid ⇝ Please send me corrections or new submissions

That's the last impression I want to give you. If you like an allround play with an emphasis on hitting/punching and you like to do that with LP, by all means: go for it. If you like hitting, isn't a thick sponge (1,5mm or thicker) not the best?

Some good pips you can try:

* Hallmark Frustration
* Donic Piranja TEC
* TSP P2/PH

But Friendship 755 is very good for your game because I played against it. And it's cheap... P1-R is good also, although it's not designed for hitting.
In short: More grip in your pip=better for hitting.

Grr...all of this EJing is starting to annoy me. Lorre, I'm going back to the old setup, for better or worse. Not changing.....anymore....not changing....anymore. If I repeat this several more times, magically I will somehow lose all of my inclination to buy anything new.

Only one last thing...I like the Defplay for chopping, hate it for hitting and looping. I understand that looping blades tend to be flexy, but I think that I have gotten so used to the stiff Aurora, that I'm attuned to it for my attack strokes. When I played my Defplay, even when not EJing, it just felt, inaccurate.

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

Projects: Player Equipment Grid ⇝ Comprehensive Thin Inverted Chopping Rubbers Grid ⇝ Please send me corrections or new submissions