OOAK Table Tennis Forum

I know this has been touched upon before in various topics, but I thought I would bring it up here. When chopping, do you intentionally give dead balls? If so when, how, and against whom? Here is my story from last nights league that made me think to bring this up.

Last night in a league match against my divisions highest ranked player I was in a situation where he was just looping the backspin I was giving him with little effort. Apparently he had a been playing a lot of LP players recently and was in good form. At first I was stunned as my default form of defense was looking seriously in trouble and was getting down in the first game. My first adjustment was to vary my balls at the table and try to play at the table to refuse him balls he could easily start looping at me. I ended up taking the first game as I pulled out LP trick I had (and more than a couple lucky net shots). But since I showed him my full arsenal in game 1, he took the 2nd easily, especially since I didnt get the net shots I had in the first game.

So, now it was the beginning of the 3rd game and it was not looking good. Then at some point early in that 3rd set, I thought about something I think I read about somewhere on OOAK, how varying the spin on chops was more important than just hitting massive underspin, I had recently made the switch to OX and so I wasnt able to put the same amount of the underspin at will on my chops (as with OX I have to rely a little more on incoming spin), as that was normally how I had been winning my points. So I started to chop dead balls (making look as much as my normal chop as possible) as well as counter with top spin before I would chop to make sure my first chop was seriously loaded. The variation worked, all of a sudden the balls were long, and then in the net, and long and in the net... and 2 games later I won 3-1. It was first time I beat this guy.

I found this being a technique I think I am going to have to start using instead of just mindlessly chopping balls back with as much underspin as I can get. I was curious how much the other choppers actively though about this when playing, and if so when, how, and against whom do you find it most effective?

_________________
VKM
Tenergy 05 2.1
Feint Long III .5

I am not a LP chopper (double inverted retriever actually, "slumming it" in the LP chopping section ) and my credo is that it's not how much spin is on the ball, it is how much spin you opponent thinks is on the ball. In my opinion, this applies to all strokes, all rubber types.

I have had matches where I play mindlessly using a lot of back spin consistently, ie not varying the spin, and lose. I have had other matches where either consciously or through bad shots I vary the spin and cause the same thing as you mention in your 3rd game.

One of the problems is how to make the dead ball or floater look like it still has spin on it as the opponent can really put it away if they know this.

_________________
Retriever (sometimes golden, but often leaden)
Moderator, Inverted Retriever Technique sub-forum - http://ooakforum.com/viewforum.php?f=74

Great topic townhousecrackers! And your description of the match was most enjoyable.

I am a SP chopper, and my OX SP imparts quite good spin on my chops, maybe about 70% as much spin as my inverted. And I play 80% of all my shots with my BH. So, I often twiddle, using my equipment to create the spin variation. And wow, this does work well! My winning % has gone way up since this switch to SP OX and the super slow spinney inverted.

But, thanks to you, I now am reminded to take it to another level, I will try to learn to hit more "dead" balls with my SP. (this will be easier than with inverted)

_________________
My paddle has a weird shape, looks like the one in my avatar image.

Blade: KTL Instinct+

Rubbers: BH Friendship 802-1 Short Pips 1.0mm
FH Gambler Reflectoid 1.5mm inverted

Yes it's a good option to have for sure. However I find that the control I have returning dead balls is less than returning a heavy backspin ball, so it probably requires more skill. If I play against a medium pace looper I might try to throw is some dead ones, but against fast players I often don't have the time, and heavy backspin helps ensure the next one isn't looped even harder.

_________________
OOAK Table Tennis Shop | Re-Impact Blades | Butterfly Table Tennis bats
Setup1: Re-Impact Smart, Viper OX, Victas VS 401 Setup2: Re-Impact Barath, Dtecs OX, TSP Triple Spin Chop 1.0mm Setup3: Re-Impact Dark Knight, Hellfire OX, 999 Turbo
Recent Articles: Butterfly Tenergy Alternatives | Tenergy Rubbers Compared | Re-Impact User Guide

Well said. I find myself doing the exact same thing.

When I first started playing LP before I knew how to properly chop, in my chopping motion I would start with my racket up and drop it by the end of my stroke (instead of chopping straight down for backspin, the racket turns 70-170 degrees during impact), kind of letting the racket swirl under and to the right side of the ball a little (For a right handed back hand chop). This would produce a ball with very mild back/side spin, essentially a dead ball. This let me control the height and pace, but produce a dead ball. I can still do this stroke and make it look very close to my normal chopping motion.

I dont know how other people produce their dead balls, but this is how I do mine. Again, this is not as easy to execute on really powerful/fast loops compared to chopping purely for backspin, but can done in an abreviated fashion to the vary spin.

_________________
VKM
Tenergy 05 2.1
Feint Long III .5

I think the control from chopping with LPs against loops is when you chop in the same direction as the spin, and fast enough to overcome the spin (ie chopping motion faster than the rotation of the ball).
I find it easiest to produce low spin balls by chopping sideways not downwards. This tends to produce some sidespin and more awkward balls as well, although it's not as well disguished.

_________________
OOAK Table Tennis Shop | Re-Impact Blades | Butterfly Table Tennis bats
Setup1: Re-Impact Smart, Viper OX, Victas VS 401 Setup2: Re-Impact Barath, Dtecs OX, TSP Triple Spin Chop 1.0mm Setup3: Re-Impact Dark Knight, Hellfire OX, 999 Turbo
Recent Articles: Butterfly Tenergy Alternatives | Tenergy Rubbers Compared | Re-Impact User Guide

I think the answer is found in whether you want to brush the ball along the pips or smash it into the pips making the pips deform. A wristy hard chop is going to move the ball along the pips (front and side), but a ball purposely smashed into the pips does not continue the spin (much)- Instead the pips deform. Note on rubbers like Feint Long 3 the SIDES of the pips are very grippy causing much more mechanical friction and dwell time, much more than any ruffage of the top of a bendable pip.

Ian

_________________
Blade: Giant Dragon Kris: FH: Friengship 729 Judo (red) 2.0 BH: Feint Long 3 (black) 1.3
Blade: Alfa Pro : FH: Friendship Judo (red) 2.0 BH TSP Curl P-1r (black) 1.4

Does anyone know of any videos showing how to do heavy backspin chops vs nospin chops showing hopefully in slow motion the different strokes?

Sometimes I do nospin (really just low backspin) chops by mistake, and they work as mentioned above, but when I try to do it, I don't have as good of luck I think because I really don't know a different stroke for the nospin chop.

I also wonder if its the same for inverted or 0X long pips. I suspect it might be quite different...

Robot drills for this would probably be good to get the different strokes at least working to hit the table.

_________________
--- Push/Chop or Attack ---
USATT 1684 left, Lost it all by playing sick and hurt.
No legs left, no more backing up, just smash it!
Blade: TTPiet OFF-/ALL custom
FH: Spinlord Waran Short Pips
BH: Joola Badman Reloaded 0X

I've been experimenting a bit with this lately, too. IMO the key to unlocking spin reversal is mastering how much the pips bend: viewtopic.php?p=279293#p279293

A very brushed contact like on touch shots over the table uses the tops more, a moderate contact uses the edges of the tops (low friction, good for reversal), and a heavy contact gets into the grippier sides. The effect tends to vary, for example an edge contact will reverse (topspin) a backspin ball, but a side contact will act more like invert and return more backspin.

As a disclaimer, this is in part based on principle rather than practice since I can't do it very consistently either. Up to now I've mostly used "safe" rather than aggressive chops, using a downward motion not unlike a reversed control brushloop which gives reversal (the partially bent pips mentioned). The main variation I've been playing with is going through the ball more like a modest powerloop, and the ball "sinks" despite the heavier contact, whereby I believe it's digging into the pip sides (feel a bit like looping a backspin with inverted, or "looping" with LPs for that matter).

I use some sponge, not OX, but in principle this mostly varies how much & easily the pips bend. With thicker sponge the pips will bend completely over more easily & progressively which is good for using the grippier sides.

with inverted yes you can vary the spin consciously, but with lp not worth it, like joo se hyuk said almost try chop the same amount of spin with lp