OOAK Table Tennis Forum

Not at all. I recommend people tape their matches and post to YouTube unless they have concerns about privacy because no one knows which high level player may watch them and give you tips. As for the losses, many people in that club/area are trained to play the right way and at your level, the players you played are likely all good players (over 1600) and rapidly improving in some cases so losing is always on the menu as a possibility with the real question being what you learned.

I did a lot of interesting robot work I will blog about later this weekend. May not get to it today since I am going to NY and still need to rest.

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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

So after watching NL's video and feeling inspired, I wanted to jot down some further reasons why I think being able to generate huge spin and arc on the backhand side is so important.

1) The best backhand loops are played down the line, and going down the line requires big spin due to the shorter table length. Larry Hodges had a real nice article on his site a while back about how as much as 60 to 70 percent of our backhand loops should be played down the line. Most players are not as comfortable moving to their wide forehand to block backhand loops, nor do they practice this shot very often. Also, when you can BH loop down the line, you can then 5th ball attack to the opening on your opponent's wide backhand on the next shot. Last night I lost to two different single-sided penhold players because I was unable to take advantage of their weakness on the wide backhand, mostly because my BH opener down the line is virtually non-existent. I'd say I attempted maybe 3 or 4 backhand loops down the line the entire night.

2) The FH pendulum serve to the opponent's BH is the most common serve in table tennis, and without a spinny backhand loop you'll never be able to return serves these agressively, unless you are fast enough to pivot and receive with a forehand.

3) If you are the type of player that likes to play off the table, a spinny backhand loop will give you the time necessary to move back from the table and avoid the bang-bang type rallies that juniors like to play.

I personally have real trouble generating spin on the BH side against incoming block, although I feel my ability to spin against backspin pushes is improving.

I think I usually say it should be 60-70% or so to the forehand or middle, not just to the forehand. Way too many players open predominantly to the backhand when players generally block better on that side. Of course, going to the middle you also have less table than if you go crosscourt to the backhand. (I remember the blog or article, but can't find it right now.)
-Larry Hodges

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http://www.TableTennisCoaching.com

Spinning balls when the ball is not spinning heavily is challenging and some people just hit those balls. What you need to do, if you want to spin them, is to start slowly. There is a range of contact speed and depth at which your racket will pick up a no spin ball. As your feeling for the combinadtions of spin and depth get better, you can spin balls. A good way to start is to do the loop off drop. I have videos of myself performing this. You drop the ball on the table and try to spin it heavily. After you van do this with good technique, you can then start robots or multiball feeds. You can also practice driving the ball this way. But you can't spin these balls unless you experiment a little with your touch. Figure out the swing speed and feeling that best utilizes your rubber. Then reproduce that feeling in multiball etc

Don't get me wrong - spin is not everything. But you don't learn to spin by driving the ball. Some opponents struggle with spin, some don't. The option is helpful.

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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 GOTTA say this, yes, some down Fh line when opponent is looking crosscourt, but RIGHT AT the BODY is an excellent plaement by default also vs MANY players.

Another ignored aspect of a spinny shot is DEPTH. Extreme short or DEEP near endline are excellent depth placements for slow topspins.

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

Status - Out of Business Janitor/Babysitter

Thanks for the correction/ clarification and thanks for stopping by, Larry! I also searched for that article but couldn't find it.

Good call. Lately in my multiball sessions I've been putting down coasters on the table, trying to focus on getting the ball to land closer to the endline. In a real match, probably 75 porcent of my loops land midtable.

It's funny because I used to be under the impression that a faster racket speed was always better, regardless of the incoming ball. I think this faultt belief is what lead me to years of overswinging and trying too hard.

Today in practice I did some multiball training against both push and block from both wings, and really tried to focus on feeling the ball. My general impressions were that against topspin I needes to swing easier and smoother with less effort and a slightly longer stroke in order to get the rubber to deform, whilst against backspin I needed to swing a little more compact and "violently" with a more sudden, quick acceleration at contact. I'm not sure if that makes any sense or not to anyone else, since I am talking about my own personal sense of touch and feeling.

As you get better, things may change. But the bottom line is that this is something you have to learn with time and it is specific to you and your preferred equipment and tied to your feeling. The technique is universal, but how a shot feels is somewhat unique to you. Swinging hard all the time makes it impossible to develop certain kinds of touch. If we were doing this full time, we would be experimenting with grip pressure and ball quality. But the closest thing one can do to this is start slow and build up over time. Improvement is ultimately the result of accumulated experience and training. Don't waste time doing it wrong if you can avoid it. Hit thousands of balls, start slowly and build up. No one has ever mistaken my backhand for slow. But it started out slow and then I kept pushing it. Even today, I saw a kid whose backhand used to lift the ball with heavy spin. Today, it was faster through the table with heavy spin. So you see, things change if you work on them. But if you start fast, they may never get where you want and you may accumulate nervous tension.

The first lesson of LTT series at TTedge is an important one. Internalize it. The desire to get good too quickly ruins a lot of technique.

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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

So being inspired by all the nonsense in the high/low throw thread on tabletennisdaily, I thought I'd try and do some looping against level 30 Newgy backspin. The results are overall pretty disappointing, and it's sad to see that my "loop" produces not much more spin than Pnachtwey. It just seems that if I swing forward, then I get that loud cracking sound like when the ball sinks all the way to the wood. When I try to swing more vertically, I get virtually no sound at all (as if the sponge was completely uninvolved) and the ball either slides off the racket or goes long. Just can't seem to find that perfect combination. One difference between my video and Pnachtwey's is that my shot is obviously far more difficult, since I am contacting the ball much farther off the table and I believe lower to the net (although with the camera angle I can't be positive). All of these things makes the shot require much more work, and my neutral/slightly forehand oriented grip doesn't help matters.

One thing I don't understand is how Pnachtwey is able to put the robot so close to the table if he is truly looping level 30 backspin. With my Newgy, if I put the spin on level 30, I have to put the robot a mile away from the table due to the massive forward speed in which the ball exits the robot. I am using plastic balls and Pnact is using celluloid, so perhaps that has something to do with it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Froz-ZYI9Z8

Looping chop is not easy. I can't even pretend to do it consistently. Long pips chop is sometimes easy because you usually get back what you put in, and short pips/inverted can be easy if the chopper lacks skill but if the ball is truly heavy, most people will use a spin avoidance stroke of some sort for relaibility.

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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

Just wanted to jot down a few notes while some things are still fresh in my mind. I'm supposed to be "working", so this will be less than eloquent.

I've been thinking about the video with Brett Clarke and BRS and how the BH loop versus backspin should develop naturally after learning the loop versus topspin, and the two strokes should end up being quite similar. My current problem is that my loop versus topspin and my loop versus backspin are two completely different strokes. When I BH loop versus underspin, I have a tendency to straighten out my arm and drop the racket too much, leaving the tip of the rubber pointing down towards the floor rather than to the side. Since my arm is completely straightened out on my loop versus backspin, I lose the potential to snap my forearm into the ball. In my last multiball session, I attempted to use my BH loop versus topspin stroke against backspin and was amazed by the good results.

I am still forehand looping with my right foot either in front of or even with my left foot, even when looping from the middle. I just seem incapable of breaking this habit. Last multi ball session I worked on keeping my right foot behind my left with my right foot pointing parallel with the table's endline, and it felt great.

I seem to have serious problems maintaining the correct body position. I either commit one of two mistakes:

1) I lean forward and put the weight on the balls of my feet, but do not bend my knees. This lack of knee bend robs me of the ability to move explosively to the ball. And being a shorter player, I really NEED to be able to move explosively to the ball.

OR

2) I bend my knees but do not lean forward, placing the weight on my heels and causing me to "sit down in a chair", causing me to fall backwards on my strokes and robbing me of forward momentum.


I am now starting to learn how to forehand flick. I tend to make two key errors when FH flicking:

1) My eyes are not low enough to the height of the ball.

2) My elbow is too close to my body, robbing me of the ability to flick down the line with any kind of power since I can't contact the inside part of the ball without pulling my wrist back to a degree that feels uncomfortable.

As a general rule, the whip mechanics for your looping strokes on both sides should be very similar with subtle changes in contact point and stroke trajectory (backswing and follow through) based on spin read and intent. I think it simplifies things considerably. When I was coming up and learning lots of strokes/techniques, a 2100 player told me that all these different ways of hitting the ball are a waste of time and that you only need one good stroke. I now understand what he meant since I was so used to thinking of all the looping strokes as different and now my looping strokes have converged - I should probably have realized it quicker if I did a simple logical analysis of my backhand back then.




Been working on this as well for a while and it's the movement that I have really struggled with because of my knees. What I am realizing though is that because I have a robot and because I am now learning the value of shadow stroking even more, just learning and doing the right movements at home will probably build up enough muscles to make it feel more natural. Foot positioning and drilling is really about training the leg muscles to have the strength and connections to do what you need them to do. For people used to learning thing quickly, that can be frustrating and you have to remember that learning is a physical activity and you need to build the connections.

_________________
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 have a similar issue with chopping. I don't always do it, and i'm much better with it now after countless multi balls sessions drilling this specific thing, but sometimes when I am in a chop vs. loop rally with the pips I get lulled in to not resetting back to neutral ready position. I have to tell myself conciously that I need to reset after each chop even if it's likely to be looped back to my bh. This is obviously easier to do when chopping because you have more time.

Muscle memory, and habits are difficult. It's scientifically proven that it is harder to "unlearn" something than learn something in the first place. But entirely possible! Good luck!

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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 time I saw the TTedge video of William Henzell looping against backspin, I couldn't believe it. I didn't think anyone could possibly take such a similar looking swing against push as against block. I thought I had accidently clicked on the Loop Vs. Block video.



Agreed that it's entirely possible. Most babies spend about 3 to 4 months crawling before learning to walk. I've never met an adult that said, "I got in a bad habit of crawling as an infant, so I decided to keep crawling." We are entirely capable of changing even deeply ingrained habits if we go about it the right way and with the right attitude.