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Very delicate!


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Timo Boll ALC ST
FH Tibhar Evolution MX-P Max
BH Tibhar Evolution FX-S 1.8
185g

Smash flick of the day.

https://youtu.be/PdyqEgX-Sls?t=2834

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Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

Cat and mouse rally of the day.

https://youtu.be/OdaUjyKetWM?t=2193

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Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

Fixing my pendulum serve. Elbow position is poor. Will post updated video.

_________________
Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

So a lot of my serve rotation has changed - it's funny to see.

Before I started working with Brett in 2014, I was probably a 60% to 100% with an average closer to 90% backhand server.

Now, I think I can go entire games without doing a single backhand serve. I serve mostly backspin/no spin, pendulum and punch serves. In fact, my punch serve is probably overtaking my pendulum serve as my number 2 serve now. If I serve a backhand serve, it is usually a sign that I am in trouble in the match.

Of course, I would still like to fix some of this, including introducing a reverse pendulum, but I think what I am realizing is that I have this weird punch that is so heavy with short sidespin that it is difficult to push short and hard to attack hard. If I can develop an attack behind that serve, really good things can happen.

_________________
Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

At Mytt, people watching my videos commented on how bad (illegal) my serve tosses were and I made a note of three things to fix.

1. Pause before the serve with ball in ready position in tossing hand for at least 3 seconds.
2. Toss ball consistently to eye level/head height without raising the tossing hand - reduces significance of backward tosses.
3. If toss is low (around 6 inches to 1 ft), make the toss vertical.
4. In general, avoid backward tosses.

My forehand serves are going be usable but my backhand serves will need a lot of work. I played okay today but forgot my camera stand. I will try to fix these serve issues asap.

_________________
Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

A huge CONGRATZ on cracking the 2100 level (2111) NextLevel

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Thanks, haggisv. Muchos gracias.

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Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

I just saw that too. Nice job Next. great tourney

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

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

Anyone who has seen NL in action the last year knew a pop wazoo a coming.

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Goof-off chopping bat
Gambler All Rosewood
Aurus Soft / Gambler GXL .6 sponge

Status - Out of Business Janitor/Babysitter

I have faced the same problem so many times and still I am not comfortable with the returning a long side spiny serve coming to the back hand. Somehow I have learnt to return it on the table but it comes back with a smash.

This costs a lot when you are at the end of the match and very close to the opponents points.

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Table Tennis Spot

If you loop on the backhand or have a good pivot, the rest is really practice. If you have trouble reading the spin, try the TTEdge app. I got better at serve return with practice.

_________________
Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

One of the most satisfying points in all of TT.

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

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

This weekend was the PA State Champs. Really looked forward to playing it and upped my playing and training time the last week. I have been teach a lot of footwork to my students so that I can work more on mine. One of Brett's recommended drills (which for some reason I confused with a falkenberg when I first saw it) is to simply to a pivot then do a cross step then a pivot and a cross step for a minute, rest a minute, and then repeat about 4 times more. I don't consistently do the 4 times more part, but I have been trying to at least get some work in. Not great for my knees but I try to be more careful in practice.

So I entered the 040, the Open and U2300. Most of my friends play the U2050 so it felt weird missing that (I almost wanted to drop enough points to play it but I am beginning to realize that is unnecessary). The O40 was single elimination, and the Open and U2300 are round robin followed by elimination rounds. I went in on Saturday to see the lower rated events as I had a student and a couple of friends playing. I recorded a lot of matches from the event for both days - the playlist is here, though sadly, none are edited:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... C7XdjYDhXA

Before leaving on Saturday, I found out who the entrants were: a Seemiller player who has been as high as 2200 USATT, a clubmate two winged looper, and the tournament director. I thought without checking the ratings that I was the #2 seed and that I would get to face the two-winged looper. Sunday morning comes and it turns out that I am the #1 player but for some reason (maybe the tournament software decided to avoid me playing the tournament director who I usually beat easily), I got to still play the two-winged looper.

I managed to win that 3-1, with a game 2 comeback that I almost exceeded in game 3, but fell short at the end. In game 4, some good risk taking and blocking sealed the match. He is someone I have played a lot, he has improved a lot recently, and would beat me if he played me every day, but I have tricks in my game built to take advantage of players like him who aren't always watching carefully - that was enough for two games. I also returned his serve better than I usually do - he hasn't played me a lot since I switched rubber to Karis so he doesn't know I have far more control than I used to have with Tenergy. MY favorite point of the match:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Zm-Gt7_yMuM&t=928

If you ever face that serve and know how spinny it is and how many times I have looped it long trying to do that, you will understand.

The final was against the Seemiller. Spinny forehand, blocks with both inverted and anti, twiddles for both strokes too. With his experience, some would take him over me. He also has a low toss backhand serve that gave me nightmares when I played him two years ago. But there is one thing that makes me a night mare for those players - I loop from both sides. So many old school player are not used to two things - good backhand loops and chiquitas (they are variants of the same thing, but the first is more about the backhand not being a safe place to put the ball and the second is about short serves being attackable over the table even if they are backspin).

The final was a best of 7. I lost the first game, got lucky at the end of the second when he missed a pop on his serve at 9-10 and took command in games 3 and 4. Let me say that whether my footwork was correct or not, this was really a footwork and forehand match. OF course, backhand played a very important role as well - I can't underestimate how much easier it makes my life to be able to open powerfully from both sides against these kinds of players.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9uRUM3Dpi ... .be&&t=673
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9uRUM3Dpi ... .be&&t=711

My opponent won the 5th game. I experienced an ankle-breaker here which probably didn't help my knees.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9uRUM3Dpi ... be&&t=1020

The sixth game was a back and forth with many critical moments. My best pure shot of the match:


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9uRUM3Dpi ... be&&t=1333

At 9-9 in the 6th, he hit a short ball with the inverted and I looped it off the table. 10-9, with a chance to send it to game 7, this happened:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9uRUM3Dpi ... be&&t=1420

At deuce, I turned into a smart coward - I decided I was going to win the match mostly with my defense as I was letting him bait me too much. He missed a loop against my push at 12 all and I called a timeout. Our tournament director thought it was the end of game 6 and wanted to take scores for game 7. But in any case, I won on match point with a short push Dima style:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9uRUM3Dpi ... be&&t=1526

So I won the title of 040 champ in the state of PA (okay, thanks to all the players who didn't show up ).

After this match, my right knee was bothering me. But there was a 1300 player that was in my group that was my first match in the Open. I decided to test my knee in this match. But when I got to the table, it was not a 1300 player but an experienced 1600 level super blocker. I have always had trouble with him whenever I played him at any level. Even if I beat him 3-0, he usually gets at least one deuce.

Surprisingly, this match showed me how much I had improved and it annoyed me that I did not want to put the knee through more after playing him because moving to my forehand (my weaker shot) put me in pain so it made no sense to play good players with that pain. I beat him 3-0, no incident, he didn't score more than 4 points in any game. I didn't record the match, but some of the shots I made were just funny. We both started laughing in game 3 when it was just getting really bad. He couldn't push my serves, I killed most of his, he couldn't block my loop etc. In any case, I was okay with the day - I always said my play was health permitting.

So I defaulted the rest of my matches.

My not playing allowed me to record a lot more matches from other players and I also recorded parts of matches. Hopefully, people will find interesting things to watch. I put the event titles and rounds next to the matches and tried to film the best players (mostly USAT 2200-2300, which is not very high, but still a strong amateur/semi-professional level).

I also reviewed the video of the match I played against him two years ago.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFzN6DQXAVs

I realized at the very least how much my serve had improved as well as my forehand (thanks, Brett). I had worked on my forehand for 3 months then and didn't really appreciated back then that it had ways to go. Well, it came through for me almost as much as my overall game. But I want my old backhand back - that thing was savage!

_________________
Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

All hail the CHIEF.

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_________________
Goof-off chopping bat
Gambler All Rosewood
Aurus Soft / Gambler GXL .6 sponge

Status - Out of Business Janitor/Babysitter