OOAK Table Tennis Forum

I play 563-1 pips on one of my blades. It's All+ 5ply 6,5mm thick with anigre outer ply. They fit very nice. I'd presume that 563 would have similar expirience.
My suggestion for blade would be:
- All/Off- range You'll have flat traectory, going too fast- I might end many balls out of the table.
- Do you play now with composite or allwood blade? If allwood I'd recommend to stay with allwood.
- medium-hard (koto, anigre, mahogany, walnut outer ply) Medium pips for me have soft feel (raw pips). Personally I don't like the feel of soft pips on soft blade. However if you go too hard- you might suffer from control issues.
- not flexy (avoid blades with thickness less than 6mm) IMHO stiffness would increase accuracy of flat shots and blocks
For example, but not limited to, Donic Burn...

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Setup 1: custom 7ply blade FH: 729 Legend 105 BH: 729 563
Setup 2: custom 7ply blade FH: 729 Dr Evil BH: 729 Dr Evil

It's a Yinhe N11. Should be ALL to ALL+, about 6.5mm. I'm pretty sure it's not the blade - it's the difference between pips and inverted.

Iskandar

I will be using a Joola Wing Medium 5 ply all wood blade. Great control but with enough speed for a good topspin attack. I can't wait.

Bulldog.

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Tibhar Stratus Power Defense
Tibhar Evolution ELP
Tibhar Grass DTecS Ox

I had a brief knock with the 563 tonight and I was able to block and counter very well after a short time. I was also able pick up and flick short serves which have recently been causing me problems.

All in all it was very encouraging. Also had unbeaten night in the ensuing league match with my Grass DTecS! So I am a very happy bulldog.

Bulldog.

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Tibhar Stratus Power Defense
Tibhar Evolution ELP
Tibhar Grass DTecS Ox

Played a couple of more short knocks with 563 and need to get more table time. Hope to play with it for a couple of hours tomorrow morning and see whether I can start playing competitively with it in the summer.

I have found the block to be secure and service return to be good in that when I return heavy spin serves my opponents have real difficulty.

Bulldog.

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Tibhar Stratus Power Defense
Tibhar Evolution ELP
Tibhar Grass DTecS Ox

Had an extended knock with 563 and realise that if I go down the road of using it in competition it will be difficult to return to LPs.

Here are my thoughts:

Block: It was easy to block fast topspin drives and get them back to the other side of the table but the blocks were not as disruptive as DTecS and I learned as time went by that I had to place the blocks either at the crossover point or say wide to my opponents forehand occasionally to win points.

It was more difficult as ever to block slow heavily spun loops and to block balls hit with little spin at all. I started to learn to hit through heavy loops but the results were not consistent. I think I am going to have chop or chop block no or low spin balls.

Return of underspin: I found this difficult to lift or flick or flat hit. I even found it difficult to push back. After a while I started brushing underneath and sometimes side swiping these balls just to get them back. I developed a long pip type fast push but this seemed to create underspin and didn't reverse the spin. I need to work on this.

Counter topspin: I started hitting the ball pretty flat and quite hard for me and won a lot of points with low skidding balls. I didn't create topspin but used the spin of my opponents to cause them trouble and create openings for my forehand smashes. Very satisfying.

Service: This was surprisingly good. I was able to generate quite a bit of side spin and backspin and also did my usual short long pip no spin serves. I need to work further on this aspect.

Returning service: As ever I struggled with short backspin and no spin serves to the pips but ended pushing these and started to flick them well. I need to work on placement of these returns to reas which make it difficult for my opponents to respond.

I found the deeper serves easier to chop back and such shots seemed to cause my opponents some difficulty. I also managed to chop in defence comfortably.

Drives/loops: Not usually my territory but I did drive one backhand at real pace past one of my regular practice partners to his astonishment from 2 metres back from the table.

Mostly successful although I usually win the majority of games I play in practice at the club and was probably 40/60 on Sunday. I usually try to go for shots which I am working on in such games though rather than playing only high percentage shots.

Most of all I really enjoyed myself!

Bulldog.

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Tibhar Stratus Power Defense
Tibhar Evolution ELP
Tibhar Grass DTecS Ox