OOAK Table Tennis Forum

BRS,

No, it is not. A banana flicker for example sometimes wants to borrow the pace of the incoming serve for his stroke. When forced to do all the generation vs. heavy backspin over the table vs a low serve with a little distance to clear the net, ugly things can happen to the flicker's confidence. Even a short push sometimes hates taking a serve that isn't going to rebound of his paddle off the bounce.

There is no one-size fits formula when it comes to serving. There is a generally optimal formula, then there is the cool ability to adapt a variety of things to the player you are facing.

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Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

I have been working on my over-the-table backhand flip a little bit recently. What I've realized is that one of the keys to the stroke is to really get your elbow forward, almost like you are trying to get your elbow past the ball. You can't be too far from the ball or you're screwed. When my 2000 buddy did a ridiculously short side-top pendulum the other day, it felt almost impossible to flip that ball with good technique because I couldn't get close enough to it. So I understand what you mean.

I have been experimenting with using the same mechanics on my backspin serve as seen in my video, but contacting the ball more on the front hemisphere to keep the serve extra short.

January 5th

5-10 mins with a very strong player, serving through my repertoire to see which are too easy to attack

Answer: most of them.

However, he reckons just a few tweaks - lower over the net, a bit shorter, and a bit more variation will make most of the "short" serves solid.

My long serves just aren't fast enough against a player who reads and moves well.

Tried to use the magic pattern, and think it helped especially with pure sidespin serves.


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I think since you are using pips, you may need some high tosses like He Zhi When or Xiona Shan to be fully effective when doing long serves as it is hard to get good spin and pace with a short stroke with pips without a decently high toss - not ridiculously high but decently.

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Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

Good call! I'd forgotten about that. I did a bit of this with Rowden and it definitely made a big difference.

Trouble is that a repeating and consistent high toss is very tricky. Definitely something to work on.

Thanks.


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"When one eye is fixed upon your destination, there is only one eye left with which to find the Way."

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I haven't seen any recent video of your games but usually, just above head height is usually fine. Doesn't have to be super spectacular, but it has to be enough to be able to do interesting things with a shorter whip motion.

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Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

EDIT: Not sure how this post ended up above my post below....was supposed to come after.

Kenta TH serve:

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Question,

In the video of the "Magic Pattern" (funny name) I see that you are whipping ala Brett Clarke's method of generating whip. In some of the movements you come to a sudden halt. In others you seem to follow through. Are you doing that to demonstrate the correct (Sudden halt) and incorrect (Follow thorugh) methods? By correct and incorrect, I'm referencing one of TTedge's tutorials where he mentions that element.

I don't pendulum serve much, but the whip and mechanics are relevenat for other serves.

I would like to see a magic pattern for tomahawk (TH) and backhand (BH). TTedge has some vids for those but I didn't find them particularly helpful for me. I think I get good whip and spin on the TH serve, but so-so for the BH serve. On the backhand serve I almost always try to deceive and place rather than create huge spin. With the TH I'm always going for spin, as I find it hard to deceive except by changing angles with the bat while the ball is tossed...which is risky.

Anyway, I practiced both of those serves for 20 minutes each yesterday at home. I tried to focus on spin with the BH serve, and what I found is that i have to really wrist it on contact. I tried to mimick the pedulum serve magic pattern by gripping the blade differently, ala pinching the rubbers and not over-gripping the handle. That really seemed to help in generating spin, but I was terrible with control, which could be just a practice thing. I sometimes really put too much pace on the ball and didn't brush enough. Sometimes I brushed far too much. I also had a hard time controlling the bat angle because of my lack of grip.

For the TH serve: When I watch vids of pros on videos, it seems that most of them focus on arm speed rather than wrist speed, which is different than how I do it. Kenta for example really whips through the serve and follows through.

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Blog: "Holy Chtchet!" ⇝

Projects: Player Equipment Grid ⇝ Comprehensive Thin Inverted Chopping Rubbers Grid ⇝ Please send me corrections or new submissions

Here is Koji's BH serve. This is what I've always tried to mimick, but could never generate much under (relative to my TH). I was always able to generate a lot of side and top if needed. Also, i find it near impossible to do a heavy underspin serve with the BH.

NOTE: Watch his underpin serve....almost no whip action! WTF?

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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 audio explains it - I demonstrate the common pattern, the better pattern and show that the better pattern can be adjusted in size. The follow through is far less important than the backswing, though the follow through can sometimes reveal issues of overcompensating for a poor backswing. For serves, I try to keep the follow throughs small to hide information about the contact.



The patterns are all here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDeVY83yRC4

In the end, everyone has their own way of approaching these things. Very often, someone will point me to a video of how Ma Long or Ding Ning serves and tell me that I am advocating something that is wrong. I can get into that debate if I really want to, but if something is creating good and deceptively heavy amounts of spin and speed for you, then do it. There is obviously a balance between what you can control and what you can't that is usually best resolved by practice and experiment. I usually find that if I take any pattern and I practice long enough with it, I get to a nice equilibrium. But if I decide that at the beginning I can't control it and give up on it for just that reason, then I am stuck with my current technique and have to accept it. I see table tennis as I practice it as the search for more whip and with practice more control of that whip.

The thing is that if the wrist is relaxed, it doesn't even have to move perceptibly for it to impart whip. You see this on punch blocks or stab serves all the time. In some of those cases, the key is the deception. Whip doesn't always mean pronounced backswing, but even when it does, not all pros have heavy or optimal whip on their serves or strokes. You can compensate for bad technique with pure physical talent -crazy but true.

But the changes in my serving proficiency after consciously changed from the first pattern in that video to the second literally changed everything about my serve proficiency. I am now one of the most feared servers in my club. I can literally drive many players under 1800 to frustration just with serves. THey play me for a bit and they wonder why they don't know how to push anymore.

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Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

No work today so I did 2.5 hours of serve/receive practice with a partner who plays jpen with a nasty rpb. Unusual style and fun to train against.

We play out points but use ~150 balls so still get massive reps/time. Playing it out means recovery and the whole serve routine gets practiced. Today we were working long serves to the backhand, for bh loop receives, and short serves to the fh for flick receives. We take turns as the server. Can be any spin, as long as it goes to the pre-determined location, and the rest of the point is free.

After that we played three matches, 13 sets.

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January 6th

Insane work day today. Just got in at 1am. Literally haven't stopped all day, so no practice.

However I did watch the videos posted and read the thread, and in spare moments did shadow magic patterns (without a bat).

I suspect this doesn't count, so no award for me this month, but I'll sti keep trying my best to do 5 mins.

I think there's an important lesson here though: if something is genuinely important to you, you plan ahead. I could've taken a bat with me. I could have got up 15 mins earlier.

Thanks everyone for their posts!


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_________________
"When one eye is fixed upon your destination, there is only one eye left with which to find the Way."

Read my blog: "LordCope's Latest Learnings Log": http://ooakforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=58&t=24452

Short practice today. About 20 minutes mostly serving reverse short to the fh. Short is ok, but less than 50% have backspin. The toss has to be close enough to my body to get the tip of the paddle on the ball or it comes out side-top I counted the last 20 to figure the percentage. After starting with 5 errors I made 13 of 15, so 65%. Not good enough but better than before.

Also fooled around with a very short bh serve that curls off the fh side 6-12 inches past the net. Will probably never try it in a match, but I hit one by accident in practice the other day and thought it would be fun. Needs a long fast serve to the deep bh to go with it or it won't 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

January 7th: Epic fail. Shattered from previous night, then swept up in family events at the weekend.

January 8th: 5 mins practice on the table. Trying to toss the ball head height or higher, and then serve. When I managed the throw the ball straight enough to actually hit it on the way down, it seemed very effective, with a bit of extra kick. But 8/10 times the ball was all over the place. Very difficult. Also starting to feel the urgent need for a box of balls and something to keep them in, as reps are way low when I have to go and get the ball.

Any recommendations for a thing to keep the balls in, other than a basket on the table? Something that hooks onto the table? Something with legs that stands at reachable height?

_________________
"When one eye is fixed upon your destination, there is only one eye left with which to find the Way."

Read my blog: "LordCope's Latest Learnings Log": http://ooakforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=58&t=24452

I use this. http://ttnpp.com/store/training-kits/179-kinson-ball-basket-with-clamp-109.html

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

Yoko Ono