OOAK Table Tennis Forum

Hi Everyone. I have been a frequent visitor, though not a frequent poster, of this forum and I have to say that it has been like a goldmine of information on table tennis equipment and tactics (thanks @kees !). I just didn't feel that i would contribute much with all the more experienced members around.

In my personal journey in table tennis (and after reading a few of Kees' articles on short pips) i decided to convert my forehand into SP.
I play TT for a couple of years as an adult after a 12yr long break from TT (used to play when i was a teenager till the age of 15).

I knew that it would be a bit of a gamble, because my team just got promoted to a higher division, but i was willing to take on the gamble even though everyone at my club told me not to. Not that they had particilarly good reasons; they just didn't like pips players and no-one at our clubs plays SP/MP/LP at this moment. Me, being who i am, decided that i would try it nonetheless.

I ordered a sheet of Friendship 802 Mystery III 1.7mm @ 36degr hardness and put it on my current blade (Friendship A-2).
The first match i played was the last one of our season (previous one) against a not-so-good opponent.
I had to get used to the pimples, but it didn't feel strange to me, because my natural FH game is sort of a blocking-hitting game.

Afther a little bit of training i decided to buy a sheet of Spinlord Waran 2.0mm just to try it out (and because of Maxim Cherepnin of TT-Maximum on Youtube).
I played the waran for the first time at our local club championships and got the third place (also beat a player from our first team in the 5th game ).

After this i knew that i was going to play short pips on my forehand and currently i am playing with the following two combinations:

First Racket:
Yinhe N9s with 802-40 Mystery III 2.2 on FH and Haifu shark on BH

Second Racket:
Friendship A-2 with Waran 2.0 on FH and Haifu shark on BH

I do notice something though when i see Maxim Cherepnin and Mattias Falck (formerly Karlsson) play:

They seem to get a lot more topspin out of their rubbers than i can get. Of course that's also because i'm nowhere near their level of expertise , but can it also be that they are using different blades? Maxim is using a balsa blade with the short pips and says that it gives him an extra edge when opening and attacking due to the extra kick of the balsa...

I have read Kees' guide on the Shakehand short pips style of playing and know that topspin is not the way to go with short pips, but somehow it feels that i can't do without a little bit of topspin (long, low flying balls are really hard to counter without topspin when out of position).

Does anyone have a suggestion on how i should deal with this 'problem'? Should i just practice more (of course, that's always a good idea :p), forget about topspin altogether and just hit, or could i benefit from another blade/rubber? I do have a Yinhe T-11+ coming my way as we speak....

Hello welcome to Darkside like you I also switched to short pipd recently( on both sides though) before that I used double inverted for 18 years.

What I can tell you is that Topspin with short pips is only effective against backspin. The technique is very important here you need to brush the ball and use your wrist and accelerate over the ball. This stroke is easier to do with spinnier pips like 802-40, rakza po, raystorm etc. i can loop backspin without adjusting my technique with both the speedy soft dtecs and the rakza po that i use ( i am a long time tenergy user).

For your second question countering low balls out of position. There is only one proper solution and that's footwork. With short pips you must always try to hit the ball on top of the bounce, that means you have be in the right position behind the ball. For lower balls you can use the safer roll shot where you lift the ball a little more. Learning to play with short pips takes time and patience.

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Thanks for your reply!

Since footwork is my weak spot i guess i have to train it more



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