September 10, 2015

Fixing the Grip

Here's an interesting coaching story. I've been coaching one junior for about three years. Over the last year he's grown about six inches and his hands grew even more –at age 14, they're as big as mine. During his first three years his biggest technical problem was a tendency to stand up too straight, which affected his strokes. In particular, it led to a tendency to stroke too much upward. Often his strokes would start forward and then go upwards as he contacted the ball, which is the natural tendency of players who stand up too straight.

Over the past year, as he's grown, he's run into another problem - he began to forehand loop with mostly his upper body, with less and less legs and hip rotation. I kept harping on this, but he had difficulty doing so. At the same time, he seemed to overcome his problem with standing up too straight, adopting a very wide stance that kept him relatively low. So we'd sort of swapped one problem for another. 

And then, a few weeks ago, he sort of "confessed" something to me - that he'd been changing his grips much more than I'd thought. Yes, grips.  

I'd known that, like Waldner and many others, he had what I thought was a minor grip change from forehand to backhand, where he'd put pressure with the thumb on backhands, which rotated the racket slightly into the backhand position. However, over the last year - probably because his hands were getting bigger - he'd begun using more and more extreme grip changes, to the point where he was now using a relatively extreme backhand grip for backhands, and a relatively extreme forehand grip for forehands. And he was running into all sorts of problems in rallies as he tried (often unsuccessfully) to switch back and forth. The subject had actually come up about six months ago, but at that time it was only a minor forehand and minor backhand grip, and he wasn't having quite as much trouble switching yet.

And now my guilty admission - it happened so gradually that I never noticed the grip changes until he showed them to me a few weeks ago. But once I saw how much he was switching his grip, I saw that that was the root of the problem he'd had over the past year with using his legs and hip rotation on forehand loops. 

Some top players do use forehand or backhand grips, but they do so only after they've developed their strokes. You want to use a neutral grip when developing the foundation, with the racket aimed in the same direction as the natural stroke. In this case, the student's extreme grips were affecting his strokes. The extreme forehand grip, combined with wider stance, led him to a stroke where he basically rotated his upper body only, while driving his racket mostly forward and away from the body, rather than rotating more in a circle. For a long time I thought this was because of bad habits from his previously standing up too straight. 

So for the past few days (three sessions – he's recently greatly increased his weekly sessions) all we've done are basic strokes where he has to use a completely neutral grip. He's not completely comfortable with it yet, but the result in multiball drills is obvious - his shots are much more fluid and powerful, and without any of the bad habits from before. From a technical point of view, his technique is now very good. He just isn't used to it. So we're going to spend at least a month where he doesn't play any matches, not even practice ones, except for a few closely supervised ones with me. I expect that by October he'll be completely comfortable with the neutral grip and his much better technique. 

After all, a Neutral Grip will lead to such awesome play that it'll induce an Elating Purr from users. And since I expect that he's reading this, just letting him know that if he says "Elating Purr" (which, of course, is an anagram for "Neutral Grip") at the start of our session today, we'll play more practice points in today's session so he can get more used to the new grip in game situations. That'll make him very happy induce an Elating Purr!

Traveling with the North Koreans

Here's the article from Matt Hetherington.

USATT Rules Committee Minutes – July 2015

Here's the link.

Why Table Tennis is a Surprisingly Great Study Aid

Here's the article – and with the kids just going back to school, maybe now's the time they take up the sport?

Aiming for a Moving Target

Here's the video (51 sec).

USATT Hall of Fame Inductees Slide Show

Here it is – watch as the pictures at the top go through the slideshow of all the new inductees.

ITTF Present Table Tennis Fire

Here's the video (4 min).

Just a Great Rally

Here's the video (10 sec).

More Trick Shots

Here's the video (16 sec).

CJ Anderson of the Denver Broncos Plays Table Tennis

Here's the video (3:02) where he does an entire interview while rallying. He's using a hardbat with basement strokes.

Krazy Table Tennis Set from 1920s

Here's the picture – and here's where you can buy it on Ebay. (Update – it sold before I posted this – for £49.99, which is $76.74.)

Rules Changes in Table Tennis

Here's the hilarious video (9:48) – with apologies to Adham Sharara!

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