Next Blog - Tuesday, Aug. 9
It’s been a great eleven days here at the USATT Supercamp, but now I’m off for my annual “vacation.” Normal people vacation at the beach, camping, Disneyworld, or some other sane thing. Me, I go to an annual science fiction writing workshop, July 22-30. So Friday morning, after taking Matt Hetherington to the airport at 7:15AM (see below), I’ll be driving up to Manchester, NH (four hours), for my “vacation.” I drive back to Maryland on Saturday afternoon, July 30 (I’m dreading the eight-hour drive), and flying out to Houston early the following morning to coach at the Junior Olympics, returning on Aug. 4. After that I'll need a few days to catch up on work, plus I'll be back to coaching at our summer camps. I’ll be back on my regular blogging schedule, Mon-Fri, starting Tuesday, Aug. 9, with the usual blog and other segments.

USATT Supercamp - Day Eleven
By Larry Hodges

This is my last day here; I’m leaving tomorrow morning for my annual vacation. But it was a really full day! We started with physical training - and today’s was short and simple. After jogging half a lap and walking the rest to loosen up, and some stretching, we did a timed mile. Below are the times. Nope, they aren’t good enough; we need more in the 5:30 range. We’ve been on the players about this, and expect to see improvement over time.

USATT Supercamp - Day Ten
By Larry Hodges

[Here's the USATT Day Ten page, with video and photos by Matt Hetherington, and this article.]

Sometimes cold print like this doesn’t really do justice to all that’s happening. With luminaries like Dan Seemiller, Sean O’Neill, Lily Yip, Richard McAfee, Samson Dubina, Han Xiao, Wang Qing Liang, and Cory Eider, and with so many of the top juniors in the country, there are so many interactions going on that there’s no real way of reporting on them. For example, Lisa Lin has a really nice backhand serve, her best serve. I told her how Dan probably had the best backhand serve in U.S. history - incredibly spinny and deceptive, plus he knew how to follow it up - and suggested she talk to him about it. Five minutes later I find them in deep discussion as Dan’s demonstrating and explaining it for her. This is how knowledge is passed from one generation to the next.

The kids got to sleep late today - no physical training. (But we have evil plans for tomorrow - another timed mile run.) After a morning of video games on various devices (and a room inspection, followed by forced clean-ups as I stood guard, arms folded), we went over to the club at 11:30AM for a birthday party for Michael Tran (who turned 14 today) and his brother Daniel (who recently turned nine). We had lots of chocolate and vanilla cake.

Sean O’Neill had to leave for the day, driving back to Virginia for a funeral. He’ll be back tomorrow. Lily Yip ran the 12-2PM session for the lower group, with my assistance, while Dan and Cory were with the upper group. (Note that “upper group” refers to overall level; the kids in the “lower group” may be lower rated, but they are also mostly younger.)

USATT Supercamp - Day Nine
By Larry Hodges

[Here's the USATT Day Nine page, with video and photos by Matt Hetherington, and this article. Here's a group shot taken today.) 

Never have I seen so many totally dedicated coaches working with so many talented players. Richard, Samson, Han, Leon, Dan, Sean, Lily, and Cory - they didn’t come here for work, they came excited to finally get so many top up-and-coming USA juniors training together with the opportunity to do something we haven’t done since the 1950s - take on the world with a chance to win. They are putting their all into this effort - not just by themselves, but as perhaps a spark to get it going. The final responsibility will rest with these kids, their parents, and their coaches, spread all over the U.S., as team spirit spreads and we transform from a bunch of clubs into Team USA, a rising worldwide table tennis power.

USATT Supercamp - Day Eight
By Larry Hodges

[Here's the USATT Day Eight page, with video and photos by Matt Hetherington, and this article.]

The physical training this morning was the most grueling yet, though this was partly because of the heat - already into the 80s at 9:30AM. After a quarter mile warm-up run and a number of warm-up exercises, the wind springs began. We started with 100-yard sprints, six players at a time, with the next group starting as soon as the previous one finished. Then they did it again, going back. They did about 6-8 at this distance, then continued with 50-yard sprints, and then 40 yards. We kept pushing them to accelerate as they reach the end, since many would slow down instead. We also had to keep pushing them to pump their arms as they ran.

At first it was almost fun, as they raced each other, but gradually they got more and more tired, and many began to struggle - “It’s just as I suspected,” said coach Dan Seemiller about our lack of fitness. Two players were so exhausted they had to stop. One hard-working one hurt his leg, but it was minor, and he was back in action that afternoon. We finished with another quarter-mile jog, and then we were done with the physical.

New players joining us were three local New Jersey juniors; Tina Lin (17, 2354), Stephen Chu (16, 2108), and Sam Rockwell (16, 1854). This gave us 28 juniors for the day, including five over 2500 and ten over 2300 - and an impressive number of up-and-comers ages 10 to 12 with ratings from 1900 to nearly 2300, plus a pair of nine-year-olds over 1800.

Next came the best part of the day (for me) as Dan Seemiller and Sean O’Neill gave a 50-minute talk on a number issues, mostly on ball placement and other tactics, and stroke mechanics. Dan led the discussion, with Sean joining in with comments. Here’s a sampling.

USATT Supercamp - Day Seven
By Larry Hodges

[Here's the USATT Day Seven page, with video and photos by Matt Hetherington, and this article.]

We’ve had sad farewells for the Week One coaches leaving us - Samson Dubina, Han Xiao, and Wang Qing “Leon” Liang, with Richard McAfee leaving on Monday night. But this morning we welcomed Sean O’Neill, with Dan Seemiller coming in tonight. Sean and Dan have each won five USA Men’s Singles titles - or as I put it to the kids, “Dan, Sean, and I have combined for ten Men’s Singles titles.” Lily Yip is also joining us, but she’s been here all along doing her own coaching here at the Lily Yip TTC. Sean and Lily give us two Olympians - and since about half the kids have put making the Olympics their primary goal, perhaps they’ll get some Olympic stories. They join Cory Eider and I for the second week.

Today was an “off” day, with no table tennis training as they rested from a week of training and the tournament on Saturday. Instead, an even 30 of us made the trip to Lancaster, PA, 2.5 hours away, where Peter Scudner (chair of the USATT Board of Directors) and his son Evan Scudner, and the staff at the Triode Media Group, Ltd., gave the 23 kids a day of media practice. They did this for free - what would normally have cost many thousands of dollars. So a great thanks to them! These kids are elite up-and-coming players who may be looking for sponsors and get interviewed by the media - and now they are a lot more ready than before.

USATT Supercamp - Day Six
By Larry Hodges

[Here's the USATT Day Six page, with video and photos by Matt Hetherington, and this article.]

I thought I’d start this with something we can all use - the “Think Circle.” On Thursday I wrote about Coach Samson Dubina’s lecture and game drills on tactics. He emailed me the following as an elaboration, which he spoke about in the lecture.

The Think Circle
Between pitches in baseball, the batter steps out of the batter’s box to re-focus. The same thing is true in table tennis; the pros often call this the “Think Circle.”

Between points, step back about 4-6 feet away from the table and draw an imaginary circle around yourself and collect your thoughts in your think circle.  Every pro athlete has a different method of processing the points, relaxing, and gearing up for the next point, but I’m going to give you the method that I personally use.

USATT Supercamp - Day Five
By Larry Hodges

[Here's the USATT Day Five page, with video and photos by Matt Hetherington, and this article.]

Today was rather a fun day. First, because the kids are all playing in a tournament tomorrow, they only had one three-hour session instead of the usual 6.5 hours in three sessions. They also got to sleep late, since the session didn’t begin until 11AM. There were some very happy kids, especially since I relaxed curfew, allowing them to have some late-night powwows. But we’re back on curfew on Friday.

We started the three-hour session with a 35-minute lecture and demo by Han Xiao on serving and then receiving, with Wang Qing “Leon” Liang assisting. (This was for the entire camp, both upper and lower groups.) Here are some of the major points he went over:

1. When serving you use body, arm, and wrist, in that order. There is also a weight transfer, at least for forehand pendulum serves.
2. The importance of a proper serving grip.
3. The service swing starts by building up momentum with the bigger muscles, accelerating just before contact.
4. Controlling the first bounce (on your side of the table) is key. It allows depth control of short and long serves.
5. The various ways to create deception - semi-circular motions, spin/no-spin by varying the contact point or the grazing/non-grazing contact, and fast, varying follow-throughs to mislead the receiver.

Here are some of the major points on receive he went over:

USATT Supercamp - Day Four
By Larry Hodges

[Here's the USATT Day Four page, with video and photos by Matt Hetherington, and this article.]

It’s 9PM, and the training ended an hour before - and nearly half of the 27 players are still at the club. They are playing penhold, doubles, and against my clipboard. They don’t want to go home, they want to keep playing, just in different ways. Cory Eider and I both agreed that this is why some players develop such a feel for the ball, by constantly trying new things, just as generations of past players with great control did. (Waldner was infamous for that, and it seems to have paid off for him. The Alguettis seem to be following in his path.) This doesn’t mean you replace practice with such “goofing off” - it means you have fun with it while developing that feel.

Several new players joined us today - Allen Wang (18, 2546), Amy Wang (13, 2416), Matthew Lu (12, 2241), and Jack Wang (15, 2537). Jack was there only for the day, but might rejoin us next week. Alex Ruichao (2699) Adam Hugh (2582) also spent the day training with us.

The big breakfast discussion for today was how each player got started in table tennis. Most got started by their parents or older brothers. I told the group I went to the library to get a book on track and field, and looked left, and that changed my life - and Rohan Acharya (13, 2133) correctly guessed I saw a book on table tennis, which is alphabetically just to the left of track and field. (The book was “The Money Player” by Marty Reisman - and when I recited the story to Marty many years later, his response was, “Great; another life I’ve ruined.”)

USATT Supercamp - Day Three
By Larry Hodges

[Here's the USATT Day Three page, with video and photos by Matt Hetherington, and this article.]

I started off the morning telling horror stories over breakfast: the player who, after a loss, utterly destroyed a bathroom (something like $5000 in damages); in another match, the same player broke his racket after losing a few points, tried playing with the broken paddle for a while and lost more points, borrowed a friend’s paddle near the end (it was legal back then), but ended up losing an 800-point upset - and broke the friend’s racket; the player who ate half a notebook of paper after a loss; and yes, me, who once bought ten cheap sandpaper paddles and broke them all, one by one, during a tournament. (It was a long time ago, and I was only 17!)

As usual, we started off with physical training - but this was a short session. After jogging to the track (1/2 mile), and some stretching, we gathered the players together. I gave a few tips on distance running - proper breathing (through mouth, deep into belly), proper form (upper body relaxed, especially jaw and shoulders, leaning slightly forward, elbows at 90 degrees and pumping straight forward, light steps, and not overstepping by trying to step forward of body), and pace (steady for most of run, faster at the end). Then they jogged one lap for practice.

USATT Supercamp - Day Two
By Larry Hodges

How do you spell exhaustion? U-S-A-T-T-S-U-P-E-R-C-A-M-P! No, not exhausted kids - how about us older coaches trying to keep up with these energized looping machines? Yes, they get tired during training, especially the physical training, but minutes later they are bouncing around like hungry Tasmanian Devils. (They never stop moving and eating. Even during breaks they are hitting with mini-paddles; playing doubles; lobbing to each other; or dragging me onto the table to challenge me where I chop and pick hit with a clipboard.)

Here's the USATT Day 2 Page, with video and photos by Matt Hetherington, as well as this article.

The physical training may be the most important aspect of the camp, which is taking place July 11-24 at the Lily Yip TTC in New Jersey, with 27 of the top juniors from around the country taking part. Compared to overseas players, top U.S. players and juniors are way behind in physical training. The stuff we’re doing here is new to nearly all U.S. juniors; it’s routine overseas. The Chinese players and coaches all say this is standard, and are always surprised top U.S. juniors don’t also do it regularly.

But the camp is also about other things. Along with the physical training, perhaps the other camp pillar is developing USA Team unity. Overseas, players train as part of a team, and the best countries are focused on beating the other top countries. Yes, they also want to be the best themselves, but they train and compete as a team, whether it’s the Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, Germans, or past great countries like Sweden and Hungary.