Blogs

Larry Hodges' Blog and Tip of the Week will normally go up on Mondays by 2:00 PM USA Eastern time. Larry is a member of the U.S. Table Tennis Hall of Fame, a USATT Certified National Coach, a professional coach at the Maryland Table Tennis Center (USA), and author of ten books and over 2100 articles on table tennis, plus over 1900 blogs and over 600 tips. Here is his bio. (Larry was awarded the USATT Lifetime Achievement Award in July, 2018.)

Make sure to order your copy of Larry's best-selling book, Table Tennis Tactics for Thinkers!
Finally, a tactics book on this most tactical of sports!!!

Also out - Table Tennis TipsMore Table Tennis Tips, Still More Table Tennis Tips, and Yet Still More Table Tennis Tips, which cover, in logical progression, his Tips of the Week from 2011-2023, with 150 Tips in each!

Or, for a combination of Tales of our sport and Technique articles, try Table Tennis Tales & Techniques. If you are in the mood for inspirational fiction, The Spirit of Pong is also out - a fantasy story about an American who goes to China to learn the secrets of table tennis, trains with the spirits of past champions, and faces betrayal and great peril as he battles for glory but faces utter defeat. Read the First Two Chapters for free!

Tip of the Week

Good Receive is What Works.

Equipment Edventures
(Did I just coin a new word, or simply force a word to start with “E”?)

Three of my students had equipment adventures this weekend, all involving Tenergy, which they all use on both sides. All are in the 1550-1700 range.

Sameer, 13, has been having trouble against slightly high balls, especially when I go back and fish. Over and over in practice games or drills if I step off the table and just get the ball back, he’d start missing. Part of this is the trajectory as when a player backs up to return with topspin, the ball will bounce out more, and so the attacker also has to take perhaps a half step back or he’ll get jammed. But Sameer was complaining that his sponge was old and that was the problem. He was right that the Tenergy was old as he hadn’t switched in a long time. So he finally bought new Tenergy this weekend. We had a session on Saturday before the change, and he was still struggling against my fishing. After changing, we had a session on Sunday and suddenly he was ripping them. So yes, Virginia, there is such thing as sponge that’s too old.

Daniel, 10, also was having trouble as he too hadn’t changed sponge in way too long. I’d told him he needed new sponge, but he put it off until Friday – with a tournament at MDTTC on Saturday. (See link to results below.) After months of using old sponge, the switch to new sponge cost him control, and he wasn’t able to make the adjustment immediately – and so had a bad loss in his first match at the tournament. But then he adjusted, had a pair of nice wins, and made it to the semifinals of Under 1700. (Much of adjusting to newer sponge is mental, as you not only have to adjust to the sponge, but you have to have confidence you have adjusted or you’ll miss your shots.)

Matt, who just turned 14, also had aging Tenergy. I’d told him he needed to change it, but he decided to wait until after the tournament, since he was so used to the older sponge. And it worked – he won Under 1700. It was his only event, and he went undefeated without even a close match. With the tournament over, and him playing so well with the older sponge, it might be best to just stick with it a little longer until he has another tournament coming up – but make sure to switch well in advance of that.

Tenergy and other “tensored” sponges are pretty much the norm now, not just at higher levels, but pretty much for anyone past the beginning stage. The paradigm has changed. It used to be players were encouraged to use slower, less bouncy and grippy sponges their first few years, and that was probably right for when the game had more balance between hitting, blocking, and looping. But now that it’s mostly looping or fast topspin exchanges, it’s become obvious that players who switch to high-end sponges earlier tend to develop higher-level shots, and become better both in the short- and long-term. See the video below from Richard Prause, where he discusses beginner’s equipment and says similar things.

Winning Without Speed and Power

Here’s the new coaching article from Han Xiao.

Ask the Coach with PingSkills

Episode #142 (27:39) – Waldner’s Sidespin Block (and other topics).

Ask the Coach with Richard Prause

Episode #17 (1:31) – Beginner’s Equipment.

Improving the Brain’s Visual Skills

Here’s the ITTF article. Includes a link to the “Redesign My Brain – Table Tennis” video (5:12).

Red or Black Rubber Worth a Second Shot

Here’s the article by Arthur Liu.

Chinese National Team Practice Hall

Here’s the video (6:49), where they take you on a tour of where the Chinese National Team trains. I wish I’d had this when I wrote the training scenes at the (imaginary) Chinese national training center in my novel “The Spirit of Pong”!

MDTTC Open Results

Here they are – the tournament was held at MDTTC in Maryland this past Saturday. In the final, Bowen Chen defeated Sampson Dubina.

“The Silence is the Problem”

Here’s the article where Timo Boll talks about how to make table tennis more spectacular.

BBC Celebrates Nigeria’s Aruna Quadri

Here’s the article.

Articles on Ma Long and Zhang Jike

2019 World Table Tennis Championships Bidding Opens

Here’s the article from Philsports. (Here’s the ITTF article – I linked to this last Wednesday.)

Highlights from the 2015 Meiklejohn Championships

Here’s video highlights (1:31) of the senior final between Jimmy Butler and Khoa Nguyen, set to music.

ITTF Monthly Podcast – May 2015

Here’s the video (16:05).

Scary Good Japanese Kid

Here’s the video (1:33) – maybe we should surrender now?

Fan Zhendong Training for China Super League 2015

Here’s the video (90 sec).

Mima Ito and the Power of Serve, First Attack, and Something Else

Here’s the video (94 sec). Mima of Japan, 14, is now ranked #9 in the world.

Driving with the Stars – Ai Fukuhara

Here’s the video (2:37).

22 Fantastic Ping-Pong GIF Images

Here’s the page – alas, some of the links are bad, but most work.

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Preparing for the U.S. Open and Other Competitions

Many of you will be competing in the U.S. Open a month from now, or perhaps someday in your future will have some other major competition one month away. It's time to prepare!!! Here are some things you should be doing or thinking about right now. 

  • Balls. They are using Nittaku Premium 3-star 40+ plastic poly balls. (Say that five times fast without breathing.) Unfortunately, they aren't on sale anywhere in the U.S. - the supply is out. They are sold here by Paddle Palace, but they are currently (and for some time) listed as "out of stock." A rumor recently went around MDTTC that I had some, and since then I've been pummeled with requests for them. (I had three 3-packs, plus two loose ones. I sold a pair of 3-packs, and am holding on to the other five balls for use the last week before the Open. Unlike the celluloid age, the different balls play differently. No other ball really plays like the [long name given above]. What to do? Probably the best option if you don't have any [long name given above] to practice with is to simply practice with whatever plastic ball you can get. It won’t play quite like the [long name given above], but it’ll at least play a little like it. (It’ll feel heavier and harder to spin than a celluloid.) When you get to the Open, the very first thing you'll do is buy some [you know what goes here], and head for the table to practice. Don't just do drills - play some practice games. You'll adjust somewhat quickly. Just remember that most of your opponents will be in the same situation. 
  • Serves. Are you practicing them, or are you planning to handicap yourself at the start of half the points? Will you have the guts, say, to serve a fast down-the-line serve against a forehand attacker at deuce, or will you wait until it's deuce and you see the opening before you realize you haven't practiced this serve and don't have the confidence to do it? Are your serves bouncing low? Are your spin serves effective? Are your long serves effective? Can you control the depth? Are you practicing serves the productive way? Have you bought Table Tennis Tips, which has 150 different Tips, including 25 on serving? (Hey, it’s my blog, so I get to advertise it here!!!)
  • Game Drills. From this point on your focus should be on game-type drills and games. You should still do practice your shots, but you need to get as much match practice from here on as possible. Figure out how you are scoring points and focus on increasing that; figure out how you are losing points and focus on decreasing that. Are you familiar with Training Cycles?
  • Food and Fitness. Are you going to show up at the Open feeling weak? The last week isn't the time to diet. So you have about three weeks to diet and train for the Pool Party tournament. You want to be in the best physical shape of your life a week before the tournament. Then, that last week, eat well (not too well!), play lots of matches, and go easy on the physical training (both so you'll be rested and to avoid injury). 
  • Playing MDTTC Players. Come prepared to play special tactics against players from my club. Practice serving high, lobbing serves back, and whatever ways possible to make our players over-confident so that once you are way, way behind and have little chance of coming back, that's when you make your move, and our overly-confident players will collapse and blow the biggest lead in history. 
  • Cash and Credit. Make sure you have lots of money on hand to spend at the Open - those equipment booths are sooooo enticing. Plus - and this is just rumor - I'm told there are other things to do in Las Vegas besides table tennis. I can't imagine what.

MDTTC Open, Adult Training, and Summer Camps

  • We have an MDTTC Open tomorrow (Saturday) – you can still enter!
  • Here’s the new flyer for my adult training sessions, Sundays, 6:30-8:00PM.
  • MDTTC Summer Camps begin on Monday and continue for eleven consecutive weeks, Mon-Fri, 10AM-6PM. They are dominated by kids, but are open to players of all ages and levels.

Ask the Coach

Episode #141 (11:00) – Gears on the Forehand Topspin.

Daniel Ives: Table Tennis Daily in China (Part 1)

Here’s the article and podcast (26:45). Daniel Ives is the founder of TableTennisDaily, one of the most popular table tennis websites in the world.

Magical “God” Serve

Here’s one minute of elite serving – see how the ball comes off the receiver’s racket different each time.

USATT Insider

Here’s the new one, which came out on Wednesday. I’m in it a few times, with my article “What to Think About in a Match”; the feature on my club in a local newspaper where I’m quoted and pictured (“You Play Ping Pong in Your Basement...THIS is Table Tennis”); and there’s the announcement of Volume 16 of Tim Boggan’s History of U.S. Table Tennis series (I did the layouts and lots of photo work). I’m also mentioned by Dell in his “11 Questions with Dell Sweeris”! They also have articles on the Open (I’m going), on Jim Butler winning the Meiklejohn Seniors again (here’s my updated illustration), and lots of other stuff. 

What to Expect at the World’s Biggest Ping Pong Pool Party

Here’s the article from MH Table Tennis, about the planned 1500-person pool party at the U.S. Open on Friday, July 10. If you’ll be at the Open, or in the area that night, here’s where you can get more info and sign up!

Top Ten Health Benefits of Table Tennis

Here’s the article from HealthFitnessRevolution.com.

Quadri Aruna on Being Africa’s Best Table Tennis Player

Here’s the article from the BBC. He’s currently #45 in the world, was #30 in November. (His name is misspelled as “Qadri” in the article, but according to the ITTF rankings and his Wiki entry, there’s a “u.”)

ICC Fundraising

Here’s an article on the club’s fundraising, from the Indiawest.com.

Setting the Example for UNOSDP Youth Leadership Camps

Here’s the article.

International Table Tennis

Here's my periodic note (usually every Friday) that you can great international coverage at TableTennista (which especially covers the elite players well) and at the ITTF home page (which does great regional coverage). Butterfly also has a great news page.

Table Tennis Best

Here’s the new highlights music video (7:44).

The Power of Sidespin

Here’s the video (5:00).

Fan Zhendong and Zhou Yu Training for China Super League

Here’s the video (1:29).

Timo Boll’s Hand-Switching Around-the-Net Loop

Here’s the video (18 sec).

Pong Humor

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Miscellaneous Table Tennis Stuff

Lots of table tennis stuff happening recently. Here’s a rundown.

  • NBC News. On Tuesday they came in to do a special on Navin Kumar, Parkinson’s, and table tennis. I acted as Navin’s practice partner and was interviewed. I’ll post when the news video is up – should be within a week or so.
  • Diet. Due to arm injuries and then Tim Boggan’s two-week stay, I haven’t been as active as usual the last couple of months, and when I’m not active, I tend to also eat more. Result? I’m at 195 lbs, which isn’t good. I plan to lose 10 pounds by the U.S. Open.
  • The Spirit of Pong. One of my students, 10-year-old Daniel Sofer, found three typos in The Spirit of Pong. Also, despite the explanation in the Introduction, some seem to think I got Kong Linghui (Chinese Women’s Coach) and Liu Guoliang (Chinese Men’s Coach) mixed up when I decided to name the fictional Chinese Men’s Coach in the book “Kong Guoliang.” So I’m going to change his title in the book to simply “Chinese Head Coach.” I’ve put in these changes, and a note about Daniel in the Introduction – now the USA Men’s Coach, “Dan Steth,” is partly named after him, as well as Dan Seemiller and Stefan Feth (past and present USA Men’s Coaches). Due to the wonders of Print on Demand, I will upload the changes this morning, and the new version will be up within a day.
  • History of U.S. Table Tennis. Tim Boggan had a few last-minute corrections, including adding two photo replacements I have to scan and put in, so I’ll be doing that later this morning, and then uploading the final version. Within a day or so Volume 16 will be ready. Tim will be selling the directly – you order from him, and he’ll send you an autographed copy. More on this when it’s officially ready.
  • Booth at U.S. Open. I’m debating whether to get a booth there. Cost for a 10’ booth would be $750, plus $55 for a table, plus insurance, shipping costs, etc. If I did this, I’d be selling my table tennis books. I wouldn’t do it alone – I’d look to share the booth (and costs) with others, perhaps ones also selling books or videos. I’m not going to make money – I’ll lose money for sure – but it’ll be fun, and give me a place to leave my playing bag all day and to hang out when not coaching. (I’d likely only be at the booth at most half the time.) If interested in joining me, let me know. Deadline is Monday.
  • Public Table Tennis Speaking. One of my students, 13-year-old Sameer, gave a speech at his school’s graduation. While I didn’t see it, it brought back memories of my learning to give speeches. When MDTTC opened in 1992, I’d already coached a lot, including some group sessions, but they were always nerve-wracking, since talking to groups wasn’t a strength back then. So I took a public speaking course, and practice giving table tennis speeches in away the instructor suggested – I lectured my dog, and the dryer. (The idea was to have something that actually moved about as a stand-in audience.) It worked, and I’ve been giving table tennis talks to groups regularly for 23 years now.
  • Olympic Theme Song. Here’s Navin Kumar playing the theme on his violin. He’s a student of mine who is leaving for Barcelona next week for a Paralympic event – and he could use some funding help.
  • Return of My Short Side-Top Serve. I’m not as fast as I used to be, and because of that, in practice matches with students, I tend to serve more backspin than I used to, so I’d more often get a slower backspin return I could forehand loop. The problem was this meant not just moving, but also lifting the ball and overpowering the backspin, which isn’t as easy when on the move. Recently I’ve gone back to my favored short side-top serves, where the return might be a big quicker, but all I have to do is drive forward – and it’s worked. Students are learning that to stop my forehand attack, they have to be aggressive, place the returns, and hide their placements until the last second, with last-minute changes. Because if they don’t…

Ask the Coach

Episode #140 (18:54) – Half Short Ball.

How Do You Maintain Focus During a Match

Here’s the video (2:50) as part of the “Ask Mark” series at Expert Table Tennis.

Training – Are you Practicing the Right Things?

Here’s the new coaching article by Samson Dubina.

Table Tennis on Cover of Wall Street Journal’s Business & Tech. Page

Here’s the cover. Alas, I believe you have to subscribe (i.e. pay) to see the article.

World Table Tennis Day Celebration – Buenos Aires, Argentina

Here’s the video (4:50) – with a little of everything.

Xu Xin vs. Fang Bo, Chinese Super League 2015

Here’s the video (6:03, with time between point removed).

Two-Hour Session in 26 Seconds

Here’s the video – all in time lapse mode.

Pistol Paddle

Here’s the racket for sale for $19.95 – you ready to be a pistol packin’ outlaw?

How to Weaponize Table Tennis Balls with a Ping-Pong Gun

Here’s the video (5:00) – ball gun shoots balls at 106mph! (Note link to Table Tennis Ball Speed article, which shows that contrary to popular myth that says balls are hit up to 100mph, the fastest hit balls are about 70mph.)

Pong Picture

The Dark Side of Pong!

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Top Ten Surprising USATT News Items

Here are some new USATT issues you might not be aware of.

  1. Chinese table tennis has been outlawed.
  2. Jim Butler, who recently won the USA Nationals, North American Cup, and Meiklejohn Seniors, has been banned from table tennis to allow younger players to have a chance.
  3. Plastic is flammable, so we are switching to tin balls. (This is what happens when you mix hot metal balls with regular ones. Which side would you prefer to be on?)
  4. Only legal surface is speed-glued sandpaper.
  5. The modern TV audience doesn’t have the patience for 11-point games (not to mention those interminable 21-point games from before), so henceforth all matches will be best of one game to one point. (With the new scoring system, the U.S. Open will now be held on July 6 between 1:00 and 2:00 PM.)
  6. Because USATT is devoted to improving your table tennis games, they will be adding 100 rating points to all USATT members. Additional points are on sale at $1/point.
  7. Topspin is illegal.
  8. Players with long pips are required to wear a picture of a yellow ping-pong ball with six “long pips” sticking out from it.
  9. The U.S. Open and USA Nationals now have first place prize money of $1,000,000 (pending receipt of $1,000,000 sponsorship).
  10. My book, “The Spirit of Pong,” is now the official bible of USA Table Tennis. All members will be required to put their hands on it as they swear eternal allegiance to USATT. Table Tennis is God, and Andy “Shoes” Blue is his prophet.

Upcoming ITTF Coaching Courses in the U.S.

Here’s the USATT listing.

Ask the Coach with PingSkills

  • Episode #138 (24:44) – World Australian Open (and other topics)
  • Episode #139 (25:54) – Importance of the Short Push (and other topics)

Ask the Coach with Richard Prause – Part 16: Footwork

Here’s the video (1:46).

Ma Long’s Backhand Technique

Here’s the video (47 sec).

Bidding Process for 2019 World Championships

Here’s the ITTF article. Place your bids now!!! (I wonder if we could run them at the Maryland Table Tennis Center? Hmmm…)

Zhang Jike Undergoing Rehabilitation

Here’s the article from TableTennista.

Ma Long, Joo Se-Hyuk, and Yan An Training for China Super League

Here’s the video (3:20). Can anyone identify the fourth? (If it turns out to be someone obvious like Zhang Jike or Ma Long, I’ll be embarrassed.)

Australian Open

Here’s an article, results, and video.

Table Tennis Alone

Here’s the video (55 sec) – who needs a playing partner when you have a wall? (A long distance runner might point out that he’s “hitting the wall.”)

9 Chickweed Lane

Here’s a table tennis cartoon that only partially makes sense. I think there’s an inside joke here somewhere.

More Mike Mezyan Pictures

NOTE - If you are unable to see these pictures, all you have to do is join the Table Tennis Group - it's easy! Here are all the past, present, and (soon) future pictures he's collected. (I pick out his best ones for here - he has more.)

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One-Sided Coaching

Had an interesting coaching session with 10-year-old Daniel yesterday. He’s about 1700 level, but tends to play way too passive in matches, and so we spend nearly all our time working on his attack – especially his opening loops, forehand or backhand.

When we were warming up for our session yesterday he was looping to my block, and kept going into the net. It was rather noticeable that the ball was sliding off his forehand sponge. I checked it, and sure enough, the surface was rather slick – it was worn out. The rubber on the other side was fine. He had a backup – his dad’s – but it had a slow sponge on one side. So with either racket he had one side that wasn’t really usable. (He’s getting new sponge today.)

What to do? We spent most of the 90-minute session doing one-sided drills, where he’d play all forehand or all backhand. We skipped ones where he’d have to do both forehand and backhands. For example, in multiball, I had him do a lot of side-to-side forehand looping off both backspin and topspin. Then I’d feed backspin to his backhand, then a quick topspin to his forehand, and he had to loop them all with his forehand. We did similar backhand drills.

Result? Perhaps because he was so focused on just one side at a time he had perhaps his best shot-making session ever. If he could bring into match play the shots he was doing yesterday, things might get scary!!!

NBC News

I’m off this morning to the club for a taping with NBC News and Navin Kumar, he of the Parkinson’s and mechanical heart. More on this tomorrow. (I had to get up at 6AM to do this blog…)

Thoughts on the Plastic Ball

Here’s the new coaching article by Han Xiao, where he analyzes how it has changed the game.

How to Serve Faster

Here’s the new coaching article from Expert Table Tennis. These are two of the main things I also stress when teaching this.

Ma Long Technique

Here’s a new video (2:14) that features Ma Long’s techniques in slow motion.

11 Questions with Dell Sweeris

Here’s the USATT interview with the Hall of Famer. (Hey, I’m mentioned – but I don’t keep track of matches! Except in my head, of course.)

Jimmy Butler Wins Fourth Straight Meiklejohn Cup

Here’s the article. I linked to the results yesterday.

Invitation to Bid for Hosting Rights of ITTF North American Events

Here’s the USATT article.

Kanak Jha and Jack Wang Qualify for 2015 Cadet National Team

Here’s the article – they automatically qualified based on world ranking.

Table Tennis “Try”
Here’s the new highlights video (5:58). Kanak Jha’s around-the-net loop against Jimmy Butler is featured at 3:27.

Ruth Aarons and Sandor Glanoz

Here’s video (67 sec) from the 1930s of the two U.S. stars doing an exhibition. Near the end they begin circling the tables! Aarons was the 1936 and 1937 World Women’s Champion. (She was co-champion with Gertrude Pritzi in 1937 as the final wasn’t finished due to time problems. I initially wrote the match "wasn't played," but as emailed to me by Steve Grant, the match was stopped after 1 hour and 45 minutes because they violated the match length rule, and the title was declared vacant until 2001, when the finalists were declared co-champs.) 

Timo Boll vs. Dimitrij Ovtcharov

Here’s the video (9:24) between the two German stars from the Champions League 2015.

2015 China Super League (Men): Tianjin vs. Shandong

Here’s the video (1:32:43) of the entire team match.

  1. Ma Te - Zhang Jike @ 7:54
  2. Liu Dingshuo - Fang Bo @ 40:12
  3. Wei Shihao/Chuang Chih Yuan - Zhang Chao/Hao Shuai @ 1:18:24

2015 China Super League (Women): Shandong vs. Jilin

Here’s the video (2:48:40) of the entire team match.

  1. Gu Yuting - Wang Manyu @ 10:35
  2. Chen Meng - Chen Ke @ 45:42
  3. Gu Yuting/Gu Ruochen - Yuan Xuejiao/Chen Ke @ 1:32:35
  4. Chen Meng - Wang Manyu @ 1:48:41
  5. Fan Siqi - Liu Fei @ 2:16:26

USATT CEO vs. CTTA CEO

Here’s video (60 sec) of USATT CEO Gordon Kaye vs. CTTA CEO Tony Kiesenhofer (Canada) at an ICC fundraiser. (Gordon is rated 1563; not sure about Tony, though he looks pretty good.)

Miss “Table Tennis”

Here’s a new music video (3:27) that celebrates the best women players.

Herbalife Table Tennis Ad

Here’s an ad (30 sec) from 2011 that features table tennis. I’m not sure why it’s labeled a “Messi” ad when it’s clearly for Herbalife. (As emailed to me by Steve Grant, the "Messi" is for Lionel Messi.)

Serena Williams Plays Table Tennis

Serena’s been caught playing table tennis again! Here’s a listing, starting with the most recent one.

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Tip of the Week

What to Think About in a Match.

MDTTC Featured in Montgomery County Magazine

This is the Olympic Sport of . . . Table Tennis came out over the weekend, featuring my club, the Maryland Table Tennis Center. The player pictured - and one of the main ones featured - is Ryan Dabbs, 11, who I’ll be coaching at the U.S. Open. To get that picture of him smashing a winner I lobbed up about 50 balls, one at a time, with him smashing and cameraman taking pictures until he got the perfect shot.

Weekend Coaching Sessions

It was another busy coaching weekend. In the junior class on Sunday, we did a LOT of side-to-side footwork, just forehand to backhand, with the focus on grip. Why? Because I’d noticed a number of the kids changing their grips for forehand and backhand. They needed to find a grip where they could hit both forehands and backhands with little grip change. (Some minor grip changes are okay, but not a lot.)

In the adult training session we did a lot of down-the-line practice. A number of players were trying to hit their forehands down the line with contorted upper body and arm movements, so we spent time working on that – hitting down the line is no problem if you position yourself properly (right foot more back, more shoulder rotation) and time the ball right (a little later, by the back leg). We finished the session with a lot of service practice.

In my private coaching sessions, one drill I’m doing a lot of recently is a serve and backhand loop game. The student serves backspin to my backhand, I push to his backhand, he backhand loops, and we play out the point. It’s both drill and game, and good practice. We also do variations where the student follows with a forehand from the backhand, or I push to the forehand and he forehand loops, or I push anywhere and he loops.

History of U.S. Table Tennis

Our long national nightmare is over – or at least mine is! On Saturday night, after 13 straight days of work, Tim Boggan and I finished the page layouts for Volume 16 of History of U.S. Table Tennis, which covers 1988-89.

From Monday, May 25, through Saturday, June 6, I worked thirteen consecutive roughly 17-hour days, where I’d roughly start work with Tim as early as 5AM and normally work almost non-stop (with a short lunch break) until I left to coach around 2:30 PM in our afterschool program at MDTTC. I’d also have private and group coaching most nights and weekends. When I’d return I’d have my blog to do and a zillion other things from my todo list. Sunday wasn’t so easy either, with 2.5 hours of private coaching, 3.0 hours of group coaching, and several other hours on various other projects.

The book is 427 pages long (8.5” x 11” pages), a little short by past standards, but it smashed all records for graphics, with 1327 jammed into those pages – better than three per page. The previous volume had set the record at 978, with the last ten volumes all over 800. (The numbers are all at TimBogganTableTennis.com.)

Here’s the cover, featuring the dancing clown from the 1989 Worlds, with ping-pong balls cascading all over him. Here’s the Magic Ball video (3:09) from those Worlds, showing the clown for about ten seconds starting 19 seconds in – but I strongly suggest watching the whole thing from the start as it’s hands-down the best table tennis song ever. I still use it in my mind to get psyched up for a match.

Like I’ve done with all his volumes, I’ve already created the files for createspace.com, which allows us to print and sell them. The new volume will likely be on sale in a week or so. The main delay is that once it’s ready, I’ll have a proof copy sent to Tim. Once he gives the final okay, he’ll be able to sell them within days. Once it’s ready, I’ll announce it here, and Tim will start distributing the flyer I created for him.

New Coaching Articles from Samson Dubina

Ask the Coach

Episode #137 (16:10) – Attacking Medium Long Balls (and other topics).

Backhand Banana Flip Kills

Here’s the video (20 sec) – go for it! (However, I’d generally recommend not flipping so aggressively and focusing on placement, unless of course the serve is weak.)

Koki Niwa Training

Here’s a new video (3:22) of the world #11 Japanese star training. The commentary is in Japanese, but you don’t need to know Japanese to watch.

Physical Training by Galina Georginova

Meiklejohn National Senior Championships

Here are the results from this past weekend. Jim Butler once again swept Over 40, Senior Elites, and Hardbat.  

Table Tennis Targets Schools in Samoa

Here’s the newspaper article on Richard McAfee’s coaching seminars in Samoa, which (for us geographically-challenged Americans) is almost in the dead center of the Pacific, about 2500 miles south of the Hawaiian islands. (Here’s a map.)

Seattle Installing Ping Pong Tables in City Parks to Deter Crime

Here’s the article.

Another Incredible Behind-the-Back Shot

Here’s the video (24 sec). How does this compare to these past ones I’ve linked to?

The Most Unlucky Player – Timo Boll

Here’s the new video (5:32).

Floor Pong?

Here’s the video (43 sec) as a player falls to the floor and continues the rally on his knees, not even attempting to get up – and ends it with a loop kill while still on his knees!

Ball Rolling on Net Serve

Here’s the video (23 sec) – is it real? I suspect the net is cut at the top, creating a thin passage for the ball to roll across.

More Mike Mezyan Pictures

NOTE - If you are unable to see these pictures, all you have to do is join the Table Tennis Group - it's easy! Here are all the past, present, and (soon) future pictures he's collected. (I pick out his best ones for here - he has more.)

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Vision and Growing the Sport

Success at developing table tennis, and anything else, involves three things: Vision, Planning, and Implementation. If you want to be a successful leader, be a VIPVision, and Implementation after Planning. (Should I trademark that? I just made it up!) If you don’t know where you are trying to go, you won’t get there. If you don’t plan on how to get there, you won’t get there. If you don’t implement your plan, it won’t happen and you won’t get there. Two out of three doesn’t cut it.

Someone can be successful without all three if they are in partnership with someone who complements them so that, together, they have all three. Or one can do perhaps two of these three things, be successful on a small scale, and claim victory while others are pulling out their hair in frustration.

In my 39 years in table tennis, nothing has been more frustrating than to watch leaders unable to understand this simple concept, or to watch those few who did understand it meet up with this opposition. I’m sort of flabbergasted that after all these years, I got fed up and ran for the board – and lo and behold, our new CEO Gordon Kaye, does understand this concept. Here’s an example.

When I ran for the board, one of the things I campaigned on was to “Turn U.S. Open and Nationals into premier events,” with the goal to “attract players, spectators, TV, and sponsors to our sport.” (That’s word for word what I wrote.) I also wrote, “We need to find permanent homes for the Open and Nationals, and let the local TT community develop and market them into big properties, like tennis and other sports did with their major events.” Since I’ve worked with local table tennis communities since I co-founded the Maryland Table Tennis Center in 1992, this is an aspect I know something about, and so my vision matched something I could plan for and implement.

But Gordon has contacts or knows how to get in the door with what I’ll call “high-end” groups that I wouldn’t have a clue how to work with, such as Caesars Palace and other organizations in Las Vegas, who know how to put on a show. So his vision involves turning the Open and Nationals into premier events through these groups, and turning them into high-profile Las Vegas events. Our vision is similar, but the planning and implementation are very different. He’s been planning and implementing changes to our upcoming U.S. Open, and if all goes well, over the next few years our Opens and Nationals will grow and become these premier events we all want. If it happens, it didn’t “just happen” – it happened because Gordon had a vision, planned for it, and implemented it. (If it doesn’t happen, well, we’ll discuss that with Gordon in a few years when his contract is up for renewal!)

Those who read my blog regularly know my Vision: Regional team leagues and coaching programs that lead to huge memberships, and national tournaments and leagues allowing professional players to make a living in this country. USATT has always had internal fighting between those who favor grass roots development (i.e. large membership) and those who favor elite development (i.e. professionalizing the sport so top U.S. players can make a living, or winning Olympic medals – China says hello). I’ve always argued that the two are the same – you need the large number of players or there’s little chance of professionalizing the sport, not to mention challenging the Chinese when we only have a small base of players.

USATT currently has about 9000 members. Imagine if we had 100,000 – primarily through league memberships – then there’d be money pouring in to USATT as well as the major dealers (since they’d be selling to all these players), and suddenly both USATT and sponsors could support professional players through sponsorships, tournaments, and professional leagues. Plus, of course, with the larger base of players we’d be far more likely to find and/or develop a Jan-Ove Waldner.

So my primary goal at the start is grass roots, where we develop regional team leagues and training centers. Much of this would be done through the development of regional associations, which would also run state championships. (One of my goals is to have 50 state championships next year, with the winners from each invited to take part in a “Parade of Champions” at the U.S. Nationals in December where they’d all be honored. Just as the U.S. Tennis Association uses the U.S. Open to promote itself, I see state championships as a way for regional associations to promote themselves and grow. This was actually CEO Gordon’s idea, which I’ve stolen from him. Shhh!)

But Vision won’t do it alone. You need the Planning and Implementation. And lo and behold, I’m now in a position with USA Table Tennis where I can do much of this. I actually have three positions with USATT: I’m on the Board of Directors as an “At-Large Representative” (since January, when I was elected to a four-year term); and for about two months I’ve been the Regional Associations Coordinator (appointed by the CEO) and the chair of the League Committee (appointed by the Board). All three are unpaid, volunteer positions. (Alas!)

It’s ironic that I’m chairing the League Committee when I’m more on the coaching side. But if someone doesn’t chair the League Committee and put together a proto-type regional team league that can spread, it’ll never happen. It’s my great wish that I’ll get this done in the next two years, and then someone else can step in and continue the work as chair of the USATT League Committee. (I’d likely stay on and focus on my other two positions to develop the sport.)

I’m currently in the planning stage for all of this, which really means watching and learning. I’m watching how the new Capital Area League works, and other ones. I’m looking at how other sports and table tennis around the world operates regional associations. But I’m also facing reality – I won’t be doing much until this fall. Why? Because I’m a professional table tennis coach who’s about to hit the summer, where kids are out of school. We have eleven consecutive weeks of training camps at the Maryland Table Tennis Center, and between that, my regular coaching outside the camps, and writing (including this blog), I won’t have much time or energy for much else. So I’ll just keep watching and learning for now.

But this fall I hope to get a lot more active. I’ve already written a feature article on my plans for USATT Insider, though many details have to be filled in before I submit it for publication this fall. I’ve started work on a number of things, such as proto-type regional association bylaws, league plans, compiling a listing of current state championships, and the recruiting and training of professional coaches. It’s on hold now until the fall, but I expect to go public with a number of related plans by the Nationals in December. We’ll have a lot to talk about then!

History of U.S. Table Tennis, Volume 16 (1988-89)

Yesterday Tim Boggan and I got about 1/4 of the way through chapter 23, so today we only have to finish that and chapter 24, and then we are “done.” I put “done” in quotes because we won’t really be done. We’ll spend much of Saturday doing corrections – Tim has been going over the roughly 400 pages, marking them up with changes, such as “You fool! This photo goes here!!!” From past experience, corrections will take a day. Then I’ll need time to prepare it for publication on Amazon, create the flyer and ad for the new volume, and update the wepage. (Also, Tim has warned me that chapter 24 is a doozy. By that he means there’s roughly a photo corresponding to every word in the text – and there’s a lot of text.)

Friday will likely be the twelfth consecutive 17-hour day I’ve worked. I wrote about how Tim has enslaved me on Wednesday. I hope you clicked on all the links – if not, go back and do so! (The first few are pretty straightforward, but they get more and more outrageous as you go on.) I am so looking forward to going back to leisurely 12-hour days.

Above I wrote about VIP: Vision, and Implementation after Planning. And guess what? That’s exactly what he did. And that’s why Tim’s a VIP!

  • Vision: A comprehensive history of U.S. Table Tennis, including extensive international coverage.
  • Planning: Each issue is meticulously planned, first about what will be covered, and then the huge number of photos. He has pages and pages of notes on what goes where, and printouts of text with marks showing where the huge number of photos go.
  • Implementation: That’s two parts, the writing, and the page layouts, which is what we’re spending two weeks creating.

A few recent quotes:

  • “I can always turn a terribly horrible picture into a horrible picture.” -Larry
  • Larry: “Would you rather use the really nice photo, or the black, blurry blob that matches the other photo?” Tim: “Use the blurry one.”
  • “Please don’t tell anyone how stupid I was.” -Tim
  • “I must have been insane.” -Tim, on the unbelievably huge number of photos he had planned for the last chapter, which we plan to do today.
  • “You’re still here?” -Larry every morning.

MDTTC Summer Camps

Our summer camps at MDTTC start on Monday, June 15, and continue for eleven consecutive weeks. Each camp is Mon-Fri, 10AM-6PM, with a two-hour lunch break. Here’s info. The camps are for all levels, but are dominated by kids. If you don’t mind being a room full of hard-working kids, come and join us!

U.S. Open Entries

As of this writing, the upcoming U.S. Open has 996 entries, and will almost for certain go over 1000, making it one of the most successful US Opens ever. Here’s the listing! When the entries are all in, I’ll blog about how it compares in history to past ones and other interesting stuff I find.

Ask the Coach

Episode #136 (21:25) – Which Serve Should I Learn? (and other topics).

Mark Simpson: Train Smart, Play Smart

Here’s the new podcast (27:23) at Expert Table Tennis. Mark “…studied psychology at the University of Nottingham, played table tennis semi-professionally in several European countries, and completed a Master’s degree in Sport Psychology.” “In today’s episode I talk to Mark about his ‘Train Smart, Play Smart’ seminars that he is delivering to table tennis clubs up and down the UK.”

Here’s a list of topics covered:

  • How Mark became a semi-professional table tennis player.
  • Why he moved away from the UK.
  • What he is doing back in the UK for a couple of weeks.
  • All about his ‘Train Smart, Play Smart’ seminars.
  • How you can improve your table tennis with imagery.
  • A three-step routine to use in between points in a match.
  • What services Mark offer to table tennis players looking to improve their performance.

Redesign My Brain for Table Tennis

Here’s the new video (5:12). “William Henzell and Trevor Brown try to teach Todd Sampson how to improve his brain by playing Table Tennis.”

“The Spirit of Pong”

Looking to get psyched up to play championship table tennis? Then buy a copy of my fantasy table tennis novel, The Spirit of Pong, and see what happens! If it doesn’t get you psyched to play, then you just don’t have any table tennis spirit!!! (The novel includes some serious training sequences – the scenes with Ogimura are straight out of a Rocky movie.) Of course, if you are just interested in learning, perhaps get Table Tennis Tactics for Thinkers, or one of my other table tennis books. (It’s my blog, so I get to blog about my books!)

Ask a Pro Anything: Mima Ito

Here’s the interview (4:52) with Adam Bobrow. 14-year-old Mima of Japan is already ranked #11 in the world. In March this year she won Women’s Singles at the German Open, the youngest player ever to win an ITTF Pro Tour Event. . In 2014 she teamed with Miu Hirano to win Women’s Doubles at the German Open and become the youngest players ever to do so (both were 13).

This May Be the Best Shot You’ll Ever See

Here’s the video (26 sec) – and it happens at 9-all in the fifth! After watching, replay it and watch the look on the opponent’s face.

Training Makes Perfect!

Here’s the new ITTF promo video (37 seconds) that features players training for the Australian Open (which begins today), with some unique camera angles.

International Table Tennis

Here's my periodic note (usually every Friday) that you can great international coverage at TableTennista (which especially covers the elite players well) and at the ITTF home page (which does great regional coverage). Butterfly also has a great news page.

Table Tennis Humor

  • The School of Bounce (2:30) – a new hilarious table tennis video!
  • Cat Net Pong (65 sec video) – you’ll never need a net again.
  • Cartwheel pong (11 sec video) – remember, this is just ping-pong!
  • Afterhours with Princess (47 sec video) – here’s Adam Bobrow goofing off with a member of the Philippines National Team. Some crazy sidespin shots, and I don’t mean just the ball spinning! I believe her full name is Rommelia Princess Naval Tambo.
  • Budget Negotiations Pong – here’s a table tennis cartoon that satirizes budget negotiations between Obama and Republicans – and the latter won’t like this. (But absolutely no political comments here!)

Non-Table Tennis – Review of “Leashing the Muse”

My fantasy story “Leashing the Muse” was a cover story for the June issue of Space and Time. The issue was reviewed at SFRevu – here’s what they wrote:

"Leashing the Muse" by Larry Hodges – William is an English professor, distressed by the lack of literary quality in the writing of his students. But suddenly, the words on the paper change, rewritten to improve the quality of the prose. This happens everywhere and to anything, even the already great works of literature. It turns out this is being done by Polyhymnia the Muse. William finds her and confronts her about it in this amusing tale.

Here’s a more comprehensive description of the story, with minor spoilers:

An English professor is disgusted with the poor work of his students. And then, due to global warming, Polyhymnia, the muse of sacred song, oratory, lyric, singing, and rhetoric, and the daughter of Zeus and Mnemosyn, is released from where she had been imprisoned in arctic ice for thousands of years by Zeus for criticizing his poetry. She decides her mission is to turn all written work into masterpieces, whether it be Milton, newspaper articles, or a how-to manuals. When any three-year-old with a crayon can write masterpieces, nothing stands out anymore, and so there are no more masterpieces. It's up to our English professor to capture the muse and convince her to stop, with the help of a super-powerful computer.

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Bernie Bukiet in USATT Insider

The profile on Bernie Bukiet by Tim Boggan was in yesterday’s issue of USATT Insider, which is emailed to USATT members and to those who sign up for free subscriptions. Many “old timers” who knew Bernie well still miss him – I’m told he was one of the great sportsmen of his time. Take some time to read about this past great, and others in the USATT Hall of Fame. (Here’s a nice picture of Bernie.)

Dave Sakai, a great friend of Bernie’s, called me yesterday to talk to Tim Boggan about it, since Tim is staying with me while we work on the next volume in his History of U.S. Table Tennis series. (Dave had introduced me to Bernie many years ago the one time I met Bernie before his death, alas, in 1995.) Tim says that Dave, like Tim in the past, was nearly in tears about it, since Bernie was so loved by all who knew him.

Some who read the profile quickly might have missed that the first part, entitled “A Day to Remember,” about the day Bernie died, and listed as “by Bernie Bukiet,” was actually by Tim Boggan. (If so, reread it more carefully.) The actual Hall of Fame profile comes immediately afterwards, starting with the words, “Sosnowiec, in southwest Poland…” Bernie was originally from Poland, and didn’t come to the U.S. until he was 34, and yet he was still:

  • 3-time U.S. Men's Singles Champion (at age 38, 44, and 47)
  • 6-time U.S. Men's Doubles Champion (the last time at age 49)
  • 3-time U.S. Mixed Doubles Champion (the last time at age 47)
  • 8-time Member of the U.S. Team to the World's (from age 35 to age 54)

History of U.S. Table Tennis, Volume 16 (1988-89)

Yesterday was Day Ten of the long national nightmare of trying to put all these pages and photos together for Volume 16 of History of U.S. Table Tennis. We’ve completed 19 of the 24 chapters, totaling 319 pages. We expect to finish work on Saturday. (We’ll try to do chapters 20-24 on Thursday and Friday, and Saturday is reserved for corrections – Tim spends much of his free time going over each page and marking needed changes, and in the past it usually takes about a day to make these changes.) I’ll also need a few hours to finalize the volume for print on Amazon.com – see the links on the History of U.S. Table Tennis page that link to their Amazon pages – plus I have to update the webpage itself. I’ll also need time to create the one-page flyer and ad for the volume.

I’ve lost track of the number of graphics because Tim did something relatively new in the volume – many of the pages are collages of graphics and clippings he cut and pasted on sheets of paper, which were then scanned. He didn’t realize that every scissors cut would show up as a line on the page, and that the various graphics needed different types of work, and so I’ve spent painstaking hours selecting portions of each page so I could work on that part alone, along with zooming in and erasing the seeming mazes of scissor-cut lines on each page.

But I think I can safely say it’s over 1000 graphics total. I can do a program check of how many actual graphics are on the pages, but that would count each of these pages as one graphic, and I’ve spent up to 30 minutes just cleaning up a page of them, which are often full of different graphics. When the whole thing is done I’ll likely do a manual count. The last volume had a record 978 graphics; this one will dwarf that record.

As to the content of the volume, let’s just say a lot of stuff happened in 1988-89!!!

Coaching

While I’m busy doing Tim’s books I’m still coaching (and writing this blog). Yesterday I coached a 13-year-old who’s rated about 1600 but really should be pushing 1800. The main weakness in his game is he plays such high-level shots in rallies that he makes too many mistakes. He also is a bit too forehand oriented, but we’ve spent a lot of time working on his backhand – which he often loops over and over. I also coached an 11-year-old who had a hard time getting serious – until he saw one of the Chinese coaches wander over to watch. There’s something about an “inscrutable” Chinese coach that seems to scare kids into trying hard. Perhaps I need to look into this – I tend to be too easygoing when I coach, and some kids take advantage of that.  

One thing I’ve noticed recently – when I play points with students they all like to serve deep to my backhand, challenging me to step around and forehand loop, which I no longer do as well due to arm problems and age. So I usually receive backhand, and they tee off on it. (My backhand loop isn’t particularly strong.) So recently I’ve started taking these serves right off the bounce, as I should be doing. I’m not returning them any faster or more aggressively, just quicker – and the result is almost comical as they no longer can tee on these shots, and they get frustrated. I have to explain to them the reason why they suddenly feel rushed. But the more you push them in ways such as this the better they get. Pretty soon they’ll be teeing off on these, and I’ll have to find something else. Maybe I’ll time travel back to the 1980s and 1990s and run around and loop all their serves. Or maybe I’ll just chop.

Ask the Coach

Episode #135 (28:25) – Is Psychology the Difference?

Training Forehand and Backhand Topspin

Here’s the new video (17:42) from Table Tennis School.

How Do You Get Into “Flow” When Playing Table Tennis?

Here’s the video (3:39) as part of the “Ask Mark” series. (Mark is table tennis sports psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihaly.)

Vote for Jimmy Butler as the Top USA Athlete for May

Here’s where you can vote.

New Ma Long Videos

Highlights from China Super League 2015

Time between points removed.

More Mike Mezyan Pictures

NOTE - If you are unable to see these pictures, all you have to do is join the Table Tennis Group - it's easy! Here are all the past, present, and (soon) future pictures he's collected. (I pick out his best ones for here - he has more.)

Non-Ping Pong Diplomacy

Here’s the cartoon!

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Help! I’m Being Held Prisoner!!!

For the past nine days I’ve been held prisoner in my house by the 84-year-old man pictured here, a ruthless slave-driver and sadist. Each day he holds a racket to my head in a threatening manner and forces me to sit at my desk from 5AM to 2:30PM, coercing me into changing historical photos and designing the pages for some 1988-89 historical book that’s mostly a constant repetition of the words Boggan, Seemiller, Butler, O’Neill, Onifade, Teekaveeraki, Gee, and Bhushan. It must be some kind of code; I have no idea what these words mean. He assures me we’ll finish this weekend, but I don’t trust him.

At 2:30, he takes custody of my computer, with links to all my accounts, and threatens to use his extensive computer knowledge to delete all my books at Amazon. And then I am forced to go to a local table tennis club and play ping-pong with the cohorts of this man, hour after hour, day after day, with no respite. They keep calling me “coach,” but I think that’s code for “You are our prisoner and will do as you are told.”

Strangely, many of his henchman appear to be children, many of them Chinese, and they are all armed with ping-pong paddles. They seem to know how to use them; I am very afraid. I believe that they became this person’s partner in crime when he visited China back in 1971 – he is so arrogant that he even wrote about his experiences there, in a book and in Time Magazine, practically daring the U.S. State Department to come after him – but after meeting him, they too are afraid of him

At night he stuffs ping-pong balls in my mouth and won’t take them out until I’ve finished typing a daily table tennis blog, which he dictates to me. It’s a silly thing that nobody would take seriously, but it has my name on it, so all those who read it think I wrote it. What do I know about table tennis? I’m a concert pianist, for crying out loud!!! (Here’s a video of two of his armed female cronies forcing me to perform.)

I am forced to live on a diet of expensive steaks, baked potatoes, and Coca-Cola at the Outback he drags me to. He often forces me to eat Rocky Road ice cream at Haagen Dazs afterwards. When I explained that I was on a diet, this is what he said. I am not allowed to watch TV, read, or any other pleasures in life as I am forced to obey the whims of this horrible monster during all my waking hours. The days are long, the nights are short, and I am in a constant state of physical and mental exhaustion. I cannot hold on much longer.

If this horrible tyrant asks me to fix up one more dimly-lit, out-of-focus picture scanned from an old, crumbling newspaper, I believe I will be forced to . . . fix up the photo as requested, as I am in mortal terror of the hulk-like strength and green rage of this old man.

My only hope is that I am able to smuggle this message out, and some decent person will take mercy on me, and free me from this living purgatory by challenging my horrible master to a ping-pong duel and beat him. If you believe you have what it takes to be my savior, all I can tell you is that he’s a shakehander with short pips on both sides, with a good backhand block and a unique forehand “no-look” smash that never misses, and likes to serve fast and deep over and over with a one-inch toss. I do not believe he is beatable, though Stockholm Syndrome may be affecting my thinking about this wonderful human being who has taken over and given purpose to my life.

Oh, and Tim is threatening politely asking me to add this addendum: “Amazing how unconsciously inspirational I can be!”

New Adult Training Program

This past weekend I started a new adult training program. It’s every Sunday, 6:30-8:00 PM, for adults only. (Technically, I will allow players as young as 13 to join in, but only if they are serious.) Here is more info (second item). We had eleven players in our first session, ranging in age from roughly 20 to 60. I put them through a series of drills, mostly involving footwork. It’s for all levels, though I’ll generally try to pair players with others at about the same level. Assisting as both a coach and practice partner is Raghu Nadmichettu, a 2400 player and part-time MDTTC coach. Hope to see some of you there!

Want to help USA Table Tennis and its National Teams? 

Here’s the new webpage, FriendWithPaddles.org, including a link to video.  From the page:

USA Table Tennis has created the Friends with Paddles campaign so that every fan can contribute to the success of the national team at all levels. The money you donate will make it possible for national team members to have access to the level of coaches and facilities necessary to compete at the international level. 

You may donate at any gift level you choose to receive the respective thank you gift from USATT, or you may choose to make a flat donation. It’s up to you! Thank you for being our Friend with a Paddle, and for contributing to the continued success of USA Table Tennis and its national teams!

Ask the Coach with PingSkills

Episode #134 (21:22) – Should I change my racket? (and other topics).

Ask the Coach with Richard Prause – Part 14

Here’s the video (2:44) - Doubles Practice.

2015 U.S. Open Men’s Champion vs. USATT CEO

Here’s the video (17 sec) of Tao Wenzheng and Gordon Kaye – who would win? With the U.S. Open coming up in Las Vegas, you can legally place your best – current odds are roughly the number of grains of sand on the planet to one. A little research and some basic math tells me that if you bet a penny on Gordon and he wins, you’ll receive about 75 quadrillion dollars ($75,000,000,000,000). Put me down for a dime! (Gordon can play - he has a 1563 rating, only 1152 points behind Tao's 2715.)

U.S. Open Entries

They just broke 900, and more are coming in. You can see the entries here – alphabetically, by rating, by state, by club, or by event.

2015 U.S. Open to Be Best Yet!

Here’s the USATT article.

USATT Athletes of the Month

Here’s the article – they are Jim Butler, Angela Guan, and Pam Fontaine & Cynthia Ranii.

11 Questions with Scott Preiss

Here’s the USATT interview with the professional table tennis showman.

Rachel Sung and Nikhil Kumar Qualify for ITTF World Hopes Week and Challenge

Here’s the USATT article.

Polish Pro’s Table Tennis Lessons Give Club Popularity Bounce

Here’s the article from the San Antonio Express-News on Coach Milosz Przybylik. (You may have to set up an account to read this article.)

39 Seconds of Ma Long Multiball

Here’s the video – it should wake you up!

More Mike Mezyan Pictures

NOTE - If you are unable to see these pictures, all you have to do is join the Table Tennis Group - it's easy! Here are all the past, present, and (soon) future pictures he's collected. (I pick out his best ones for here - he has more.)

  • Paddle in Pants Pong – do we call it panthands or panthold?
  • Crazy Yoga Pong – Twister on a table?
  • Net Pong – and when it hatches you’ll have your very own table tennis player.
  • Baby Pong – silly baby doesn’t realize you legally have to have a free hand.
  • Street Pong – for those who wish to live short but exciting lives.
  • Dessert Pong -DO NOT click on this on an empty stomach.
  • Frying Pan Pong – of course, this is what the sore loser does to the winner.

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I hope these USATT history volumes sell enough to justify the effort - at 14 volumes and counting. I admire your dedication, but is there really that much to say about the subject? History of Roman Empire by Gibbon was 7 volumes...

In reply to by pgpg

To be clear, they are by Tim Boggan. I only do the page layouts and photo work. (Mal Anderson scans and supplies the bulk of the photos.) They are rather comprehensive, and no, the sales do not really justify the work put into them, but Tim doesn't do them for the money. They are instead a legacy of the game, as well as his own legacy. He could, of course, choose to "retire" from such work at age 84, and take up shuffleboard, but that's not Tim. (But while we're slaving away putting the pages together, I kinda wish we were playing shuffleboard - it's painstaking work!)

Top Ten Craziest Shots I’ve Ever Done

Some of the kids I coach were talking about the craziest shots they’ve ever done. So I’ve compiled my Top Ten list. How about you?

  1. An opponent mishit a shot off the edge of his racket, popping it up high on my side with a crazy backspin that made it bounce back over the net to his side. I ran to the left side, and smashed it as hard as I could – straight down. The ball went down at great speed, the ball went down at great speed . . . and then just dropped. Because I’d hit it almost exactly straight down, it dropped back down over the table. I was stuck on the side of the table when my opponent pushed my smash back for a winner! I actually dived for the ball and got my racket on it, but couldn’t make the return.
  2. I was back lobbing when the opponent smashed weakly to my backhand. I chopped it back down the line to the opponent’s forehand. He pushed it right off the bounce at an extreme angle to my forehand, so that it bounced on my side of the table and crossed the sideline to the right. There was no way I could get to the ball the normal way by going around the corner of the table. So I dived under the table, inside the table leg on the near right, and managed to make the return by scooping the ball back up off the floor. I didn’t see it, but my opponent pushed it back for a winner as I lay on the floor on my stomach.
  3. A player popped a ball up to my very wide backhand at an angle so it went well to the left of the table. I stepped around and tried smashing it down the line. Instead, the ball hit the left net post. It bounced to the left, and hit the right side post (!), and bounced back sideways, where it hit the net, balance there for a second, and then dribbled over for a winner.
  4. An opponent dribbled the ball over the net at 19-all. (This was a long time ago, when I was 17 and games were to 21.) I lunged over the table, putting my left (non-playing) elbow on the table, and managed to scoop the ball up and return it. My opponent caught the ball and claimed the point, saying I’d touched the table with my non-playing hand. It so happened that the opponent was the tournament referee!!! I was in one of my first tournaments, and yet I knew he was wrong – the free hand is defined as from the wrist down. But he insisted that the elbow was considered part of the free hand, and claimed the point. So instead of being up 20-19, I was down 19-20. I won the next point (should have been the game), but lost in deuce. He won the second, and so won two straight. (I was about 1700 at the time to his 1900.)
  5. At the North American Teams in Baltimore one year I was at deuce in the third with Samson Dubina, who was around 2300 or so at the time. He smashed side to side several times, and I managed to run them down. Then he smashed really hard to my wide forehand, and I raced after it into the adjacent court. In almost one motion, I made the return while knocking over a 13-year-old and giving him a bloody lip. I won the point and the match – the last time I’d ever beat the future USA Men’s Singles Finalist.
  6. There used to be a rule that you couldn’t foot stomp on your serve. This was so players couldn’t hide which surface on their racket they were hitting with before the color rule came about in 1983. (This was circa 1981 or 1982.) I had an uncertified and inexperienced umpire for a match against a very strong player. As I’d find out later, the player told the inexperienced umpire that if I lifted my foot when I served, that was a foot stomp, and I should be faulted. Well, I always lift my foot when serving, it’s part of the motion, but it’s not a foot stomp, which was defined as an attempt to hide the sound of contact – and I didn’t make any noticeable sound in lifting my foot up and dropping it to the ground as I served. But the umpire fell for my opponent’s trick, and faulted me! When I found out why, I called the referee. The referee sided with me. But the opponent pointed out that foots-stomping is a judgment call, and correctly pointed out that an umpire can’t change a judgment call. After thinking it over, the referee reluctantly agreed, and awarded my opponent the point. It’s the only time in 39 years of play that I’ve been faulted – but I won the match.
  7. While playing Sunny Li when he was about ten years old and dominating the U.S. in that age group (rated about 2100), I was up match point – I forget the score. He served short backspin, and I opened my racket and did a backspin scoop, popping the ball up short with heavy backspin so it bounced right back to my court for the match-winner, as Sunny could only watch. (I think I was up around 20-12 at the time.)
  8. In a match with 1985 U.S. Men’s Champion Hank Teekaveerakit, I aced him down the line on the first serve of the match. He was a penhold looper who tried to loop all deep serves, but I had a very deceptive motion that looked like I was going crosscourt. I served fast down the line again, and aced him again. He shook his head, grumbling to himself. I decided to go for it again, and aced him again! Hank, who was about 2600, began laughing, and said (pronouncing the r’s like l’s), “Lally, Lally, nobody serves fast down the line three times in a row!” After that he returned most of my serves with his backhand, and easily won that game and took a big lead in the second. At that point he lined up way over on his backhand side for the first time since the first three points, and sort of smiled. The rest of the game I served fast to the corners and he was able to loop most of them with his forehand – a pretty good practice session for him!
  9. In the quarterfinals of the New Jersey Open I played David Zhuang. After he won the first two and was up about 17-10 in the second, I began to play exhibition, and he went along as we took turns lobbing and other tricks. But the umpire didn’t like it. I was blowing back balls, David was kicking them back, and the umpire was on his feet trying to catch the ball while yelling the point was over!!! Seeing this, David and I began hitting down the line, my backhand to his forehand, just out of reach of the umpire, who kept reaching for the ball. Finally I think he did deflect it and the rally ended. David got the point (since I’d blown the ball back before he’d kicked it), but we were yellow carded. David said he couldn’t risk getting red-carded, so we played it straight the rest of the way – or more specifically, we put on a lobbing exhibition the rest of the way with only legal shots.
  10. I was playing Dave Sakai in the early 1980s in a match at the Northern Virginia Table Tennis Club. (I was club president.) We were on table three. Top-seeded Eric Boggan (top 20 in the world, two-time U.S. Men’s Champion) was on table one. The tables were a bit crowded together, but he was still two courts away when this happened. I was back lobbing, and put the ball too short to Dave’s wide backhand. He did a backspin smash to my wide backhand at a crazy angle. But I saw it coming, and was off and running for it before he even hit it. No one was playing on table two, but the ball went all the way to court one. I not only got to it, I counter-smashed with my forehand – and then ran smack into Eric, knocking him down. He wasn’t happy. Dave, who hasn’t missed a block since the 1960s, of course blocked my smash back for an easy winner as I was also on the floor after the collision with Eric.

Reviews and Articles about “The Spirit of Pong”

More reviews are coming out on my fantasy table tennis novel, The Spirit of Pong. They’re pretty good! But I’ll let you judge. Newest ones are from Expert Table Tennis (which sounded like a 5-star review until the very end!) and a new one on Amazon. The book is selling pretty well!

History of U.S. Table Tennis, Volume 16 (1988-89)

I was exhausted before we started on Monday morning. On Sunday, I’d started work at 4:45 AM and finished at 8:30 AM. Along the way I did 6.25 hours work on Tim Boggan’s History of U.S. Table Tennis, and seven hours of private and group coaching. But it didn’t end there – I then stayed up late watching Game of Thrones, Silicon Valley, and Veep – it’s my weekly “TV night” - and then staying still later to do the Tip of the Week and blog for Monday and other work. I went to bed Sunday night around 1:30 AM . . . and got up at 6:30 AM Monday to work with Tim. We worked from 7:00AM to 4:30PM on his book (with a long lunch break, fortunately), finishing chapters 13 and 14, pages 196-244, and well over 100 graphics. It’s slow going; we started last Monday (eight days ago), and expect to finish sometime this next weekend, so about two weeks total.

About 20 of the pages were direct scans from pages that Tim had glued on sheets of paper as collages of photos and articles. Alas, he didn’t realize that when you cut and paste articles with scissors, every cut shows up when you scan the pages. So I spent a huge amount of time painstakingly erasing all the paper cuts. I have now banned all scissors from Tim; he’s not allowed to come within ten feet of them.

I came close to skipping the blog this week due to complete exhaustion, but I’m determined to keep it going. At this point I think I’m living on Mountain Dew, the only thing keeping me going. But I’ll be off that as soon as we finish.

Having a First Game Plan

Here’s the new coaching article from Han Xiao. This is a great article that should get you thinking.

As to me, I always have a first game plan. On my serve, I want to attack, but I need to find out which serves will set me up to attack against this opponent. I also want to try out a number of my “trick” serves to see which work – and one I find ones that gives the opponent trouble, I want to keep going back to those serves periodically for “free points,” spacing them out so the opponent doesn’t get used to them. Then I’ll basically go into a cycle of varied short serves to set up my attack, sudden deep serves that will often force mistakes or weak attacks I can counter-attack against, and the trick serves that work.

On my opponent’s serve, I want to force rallies, and so my plan in the first game is often to topspin the serve back any way I can, usually deep to the backhand, and then rally. Often I backhand flip to force backhand-to-backhand rallies, taking the opponent’s serve out of the equation while challenging him to try to outlast my super consistent (though not very aggressive) backhand. I’ll also start pushing short against short backspin or no-spin serves, and try to find the right balance between short pushes and flips. If the serves go long, I either forehand loop or backhand drive. As the match goes on, if necessary I’ll get more aggressive against deep serves, looping them with my forehand whenever I can – but only if necessary; if I can disarm them and win with controlled backhand receives, I’ll stick to that.

Ask the Coach

Episode #133 (32:01) – How to do a Deceptive Topspin Serve and other topics.

To All the Kids Who Love Ping Pong

Here’s a new table tennis music video (4:18) from China.

Kenji Matsudaira vs. Enzo Angles

Here’s video of a pretty good match (4:02, with time between points removed), from the 2015 French League. Matsudaira of Japan is #102 in the world (formerly #34), while Angles of France is #174.

Arguing About Benghazi Talking Points

Here’s the political table tennis cartoon.

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In reply to by tom

Oops, I got the Matsudaira's mixed up - I did a quick search on the world ranking page and used the ranking from the first one I saw, forgetting there was a second. I'll make the correction - thanks.