OOAK Table Tennis Forum

That FDZ serve is pretty difficult to do...Mostly because as one learns this the old serve gets ruined. Losing one's serve is remarkably painful. It's not like changing any other type of swing in TT. You NEED to serve.

I've been at that for over a month and at this point I am putting some weight on my back leg and doing the step with the left leg. I've yet to move my back leg. At least the serve is OKish and the recovery is there.

Maurice, you got some different responses and they all make some sense. The good thing is, you can take whatever you want.

There are some legit approaches to playing high balls and there are lots of bad ones too. One things is for sure - you need to practice this situation and it shouldn't be something that only happens in matches.

I'd like to see what you are doing against these "easy ball pop ups" because that can make a pretty big difference. Please either post here or email me.

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I'm addicted to watching https://youtu.be/8hApSJ2-xuc?t=28 in slow motion. The forehand that's being done here is remarkably different than mine but he seems to be quite confident with it. The trex forward smash almost? I like it because it's low to high, he stays low and he hits the ball pretty darn flat. Something to be learned there...

Also I noticed mickd actually move his paddle in on the return for a well timed push, but at the last instant pulls his paddle back and does a sort of bottom brush late push that gets demolished.

I hear you Russ. Losing your serve for a while isn't really an option.

This serving movement is the best and it's very common at elite level. I just chose one of a thousands good examples. It doesn't mean that everyone will have to do exactly this serve and it doesn't mean it must happen tomorrow.

I've taught this type of motion to many people (maybe hundreds). I will teach it to 30 more people in an upcoming live seminar over 1.5 hours. So far, a decent percentage of people have at least got it in training. That said, we all know how much work it takes to implement stuff into a match. I also admit that I've had a lot more quick success with juniors.

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Thanks BRS.


Thanks Russ. The BH opening against serves is something that I've only started to get more confident with recently. I used to play basically all FH.


Thanks chopblock. I'm going to post one more set soon... against a different guy... This time I only take like 3 or 4 points because I just can't return his serves well and my FH/BH were both really inconsistent. That's what I meant by the bad match play haha. Against this opponent, he makes everyone feels like they're playing well.


Thanks NL. He was definitely playing at like 60% whereas I was trying much harder. It's true about over drilling for rallies. Having like 60% of my play time just blocking and rallying so others can practice attacking, 35% doing drills like that for myself, and less than 5% playing matches is definitely the reason why the balls I hit are just like practice balls. And this is an issue I've been working on a lot recently. I need better angles and placement, which I'm slowly... very slowly.. working on.


Thanks for more detail! I had a look at all the places you mentioned and I've also given it some thought. I'm actually not sure why I jump again to the middle after every serve. I'll try it without next time and see how it feels. I think I know why it has become like that, but I agree that it's probably not the best thing to do. Since a long time ago, I always consciously tried to do this: move after every shot, move again before every shot. So I'll hit a ball, move once, then move again in position to hit the next ball, then move again, then move into position to hit the next ball. I've generally tried to do something similar after serve too. Serve, move to the ready position, then move into position for the next ball. I seem to have made my ready position in this case the middle of the table, but I should have the ready position as where I move my feet right after the serve, which is generally a more FH dominate stance. Interestingly, my receive stance is also in the middle of the table. I guess that's just where I'm most comfortable to take any ball from.

For the balls at 0:39 and 0:51, I can't say why I did that. I agree I should have taken it on my FH. My body just did everything automatically. I don't know how bad it would be if I actually moved properly and took the ball well with my BH, but I didn't. I think ideally in my head, I would go for a FH there. A video that zeio linked awhile back on myTT also had the Chinese women's national coach (I think it was) explain why you should always take balls to the middle with your FH. But so many people nowadays, generally females who play closer to the table, take those balls with their BH instead. I do wonder if this is a technical flaw or if both are acceptable for different players.

Your comment about my BH opener against underspin being stronger is an interesting one. I think my stance and recent incline to use my BH to open more gives off that impression. But my FH is still actually much stronger haha. I can't quantify it but by feel, I'd dare say maybe even twice as strong. Against heavy pushes, I don't think my BH is able to lift it at all, so it's all FH. But you are what you practice and I've been practicing significantly more BH than FH recently because I want to balance my game. And I think a lot of my improvement recently has been because people can no longer just push into my BH and have me guaranteed just to push it back. Same with if they played to my BH, I used to just passively block it back.

The TLDR version of that is just I need to remind myself to use more FH


Thanks Brett. I've never considered this and it seems like something easy I can try and add. I'll work on it People have been complimenting my serve recently, but it seems really split. Some people say it's horrible, and some say it's really good. All I know is that it's far, far, FAR from perfect.

My opponent actually gave me some advice on the serve. He said I need to work on the toss. When my toss was consistent, the serve had good quality. But my toss was all over the place. So whenever he saw my toss looked inconsistent, he knew the quality of the serve was going to be low. He said I should think about tossing the ball with my legs. Using the bending and unbending of the knees to power the toss instead of over-relying on the arm. That would increase the consistency. I actually thought this was really good advice. And to be honest, I've never heard anyone describe the toss like that. Having the legs bend and unbend to power it.

Thinking about it now, I feel like that approach would also create what you recommended me to try with the straightening of the leg too.

I used to watch his shots a lot because his FH was really beautiful. He has a really whippy arm during these shots. And they do have some side spin to them. A few years ago I asked him about it and he tried to teach me how to do it. But I lack his mechanics so I mine never had any power to them. It was like a slower spinny ball instead. He stressed the importance of forward weight transfer, which you can see with his legs being so aggressively forward after the shot.

The return was poor, but I also completely misread the spin on the serve, so I adjusted my stroke midway, putting it on the table but with no quality. He clearly was hoping for something like that since he served with the intent of a pivot attack. Now I wonder what the point would have looked like if I just went for the short push like how I originally intended when I went forward. I might have returned it shorter on the table preventing him from his pivot attack. But I suspect it would have been a really high ball for him to attack in a different way.

That's exactly what I wanted to say about it. For me it all feels like a timing error. And I try to correct this by moving into position. This usually requires a small step forward, and I find transferring weight more aggressively forward than you would after you get that first tiny step in to retime your stroke helps a lot.

I did some random practice on Monday. I haven't actually done any random practice for awhile so my goal wasn't only to improve my opening or whatever. I was actually trying out new serves too since those are the only times I can practice new serves. One of the ones I was going for was a side spin hook serve (I think it's called). And my practice partner usually popped those up with a push. My movement was automatic, but what I found I did well was moving in a little with an extra step to retime it. If I stayed where I was originally positioned, I definitely would have reached forward and ended up overshooting the table because my body wasn't in the shot and my racket angle would open more than I want the further forward I reach.

Here's what I mean:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_Suy55rUsg

First one I go cross court and 2nd one I go down the line. The middle one was a failed serve. Too lazy to cut it out at the moment. Sorry.

I thought about it a bit more and I realize that when I say shorten the stroke it rarely ever means to really shorten stroke. What I really mean is to reduce the amount of upper arm power you bring to the stroke and to power the stroke more with your body. It won't feel as if you are hitting the ball as hard but you often will hit it much better and with more control.

But as Brett did point out, without video it is hard to give good advice because sometimes what we call an easy ball is not easy for reasons we are not aware of. In fact failing to be aware of complicating factors in both the ball you are hitting and the quality of your technique is one of the biggest reasons people get frustrated at their misses. It has been rewarding for me to get good enough to realize that many of my misses at prior playing levels were largely because my technique wasn't good enough and not.because I was playing particularly badly.

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

That was in the video of Li Sun coaching hobby players in like a shopping mall or something, iirc. I think it depends on styles and either is legit. WR1 Chen Meng and world champion LSW def step to their right to play bhs from the middle. So how wrong could it be?

But CNT Olympics gold medal SYS plays way more fhs. If your fh is twice as strong, and you move well, playing fh from the middle is probably better.

But I wouldn't call playing bh from the middle a flaw. If it works for the player it's good, value judgments don't really apply.

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Error deleted.

_________________
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

Since you don't watch men's table tennis. Hugo Calderano and Lin Gaoyuan are potential examples. Usually though, it is a long ball that was misjudged and they use their technical versatility to adapt.

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One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
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"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

Thanks nextlevel and to others for your helpful comments. I would like to expand my issue as I feel it is more of a mental issue than a pure technical issue.
When I blast a easier ball with 50% chance of going in past my opponent so they do not even get their bat to the ball you get claps from the audience. So you get a psychological reward for taking too much risk and IT FEELS GOOD.
When in the same situation you keep your form for a 90% chance of going in but use placement and spin to get your opponent to hit the ball but it does out or into the net you get no claps.
It feels good but not as much as the first situation.
Mentally I seem to be addicted to the first feeling and it makes me lose form for the easier balls.
Its a habit I have got that I am finding hard to change.

Yeah I am the first to admit I usually play boring table tennis with any excitement tied to athleticism. Most of my good looking shots happen against worse players when I can do pretty much whatever I want and win and I try to do flashy things when up in the match or when I have ti rise to a difficult challenge and play a great shot. I largely avoid unsound shots and deep placements and usually go wide because my balls tend to land short on the table.

So playing for the gallery is a completely different thing - I really don't know how to do it. Chop blocks, lobs, hand switches etc are alien to me. The fanciest thing I do in a match is get pulled to the wide forehand and hit the ball down the line round the net to the opponent's backhand corner for a winner.

I prefer to win than to play pretty table tennis relatively speaking.

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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 am not an EJ -- at least not yet. I have been playing with Big Dipper 39 degrees 2.2mm on my FH for roughly 2 weeks and so far I am enjoying it. It doesn't seem slower than Nittaku Fastarc G-1, possibly because I used that in 1.8mm.

I have a question regarding how to take care of the rubber. It came with a protective sheet. After I finish playing I clean it with foam/sponge and then apply the protective sheet (see 1). When I removed the protective sheet today, the rubber looked like in 2, i.e. it does not look clean imo.

Does it make sense washing the protective sheet with water to remove the dust?

I don't know if it is right but I had to rinse the dust off my protection sheets too. Seemed to work.

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Smile in the mirror. Do that every morning and you'll start to see a big difference in your life.

Yoko Ono