May 8, 2015

Current Activities and USATT Work

My todo list currently runs approximately the length of three football fields, and that’s in 6-point font. I won’t bore you with the small stuff.

This past week, and hopefully finishing today, has been “The Spirit of Pong” Week. I had eight people read and critique the fantasy table tennis novel, which I blogged about on March 16 and a few times since. It’s now complete, except for the page layouts, which I hope to finish today. Since I wrote it for the table tennis market, I’m self-publishing it. (If I were aiming for the general fantasy-reading public, I’d have to go through a publisher.) If all goes well, it should go on sale in a week.

Next week (probably starting tomorrow) is Samson Dubina Week. He’s written a new coaching book, and I’ve agreed to edit it. I really need to finish it within a week because the following week things get even busier. I’ll probably have some long afternoons at Ledo’s Pizza. (I get a lot done there, sometimes going there at 11AM and staying until 2:30 PM, when I leave to do pickups for the afterschool program.)

The following week (May 18-21) is Disabled Veterans Coaching Week. Here’s the flyer about the camp I’m running at MDTTC. At the end of the week I’ll also be attending Balticon, an annual science fiction convention. I’m a panelist, and will be promoting my fantasy novel Sorcerers in Space.

The following two weeks (starting May 25) are Tim Boggan Weeks. As he’s done annually for the last 15 years or so he’ll be moving in with me for 10-14 days so I can do the page layouts and photo work for the next volume of his History of U.S. Table Tennis. This will be Volume 16, covering 1988-89.

The following week I catch my breath. (Actually, I’ll likely spend it on USATT work - see below.)

The following week, starting June 15, we begin eleven consecutive weeks of camps at MDTTC, Mon-Fri every week, 10AM-6PM. (I’ll miss at least two of the camps, July 6-10 for the U.S. Open, and July 27-31 for my annual nine-day science fiction writing workshop vacation at The Never-Ending Odyssey in Manchester, NH, which I’ll be attending for the seventh time.

In addition to all the above, I’m also trying to do my daily blog and weekly tips, coach full-time, promote MDTTC, and do a bunch of volunteer USATT work.

I have three volunteer (unpaid) positions with USATT: I’m on the Board of Directors (since January), I chair the USATT League Committee, and I’m the Regional Associations Coordinator. (The latter two are recent appointments.) The board activities are ongoing, with monthly meetings (mostly teleconferences), and various issues that come up day to day. I’ve got a series of bylaw proposals coming up, but we’ll probably wait for an in-person meeting for that, I think in September. I’ll blog about them later.

For the League Committee and Regional Associations Coordinator, I’m currently in “Learning and Gathering Info” mode. As I told the board when I took these two positions, most of my work on these would mostly start in the Fall, after our summer camps end. I’ll write more about this later. I’ve written an article for USATT Insider on upcoming plans (and plan to do an accompanying podcast), but may hold back on that until later, when I have more time. The basic plan is to create regional associations, with a three-pronged purpose: State Championships, Regional Team Leagues, and Training Centers and Junior Programs. I’m putting together proto-types for each (including regional association bylaws), and then we’ll begin the process of promoting and developing them, state by state and region by region. And then USATT membership explodes, our top players dominate, and USA Table Tennis becomes the center of table tennis on this planet.

Miscellaneous Coaching Happenings

  • Feet and Grip. With several new players joining us recently, once again an old maxim of mine keeps working out - if you get the feet and grip right, everything in between tends to fall into place. Here’s my Tip of the Week on that, Grip and Stance.
  • Ball Stomping. Yesterday a new 6-year-old joined the afterschool program. In the first five minutes he intentionally stepped on and broke 12 balls before we realized what was going on. This was a repeat of what another 6-year-old had done previously.
  • Big Bug, Big Bird, and Ants. The priorities of a little kid are a bit different than others. The highlight of yesterday’s sessions was the appearance of a big beetle that the kids thought was a cockroach but was actually I think a patent leather beetle. The highlight of the session the day before was when Big Bird flew into the club (actually probably just a sparrow). We turned all the lights out with the doors open to get it to fly out. Meanwhile, on break yesterday a bunch of the kids took empty plastic bottles outside and collected ants.
  • Arm Problems. I’m still having arm problems, especially if I do repetitive forehands (hitting or looping), forehand pendulum serves, or feeding backspin in multiball.
  • Tardiness. Is there a reason that in a one-hour junior session, over half the kids consistently show up at least five minutes late, and some come in fifteen minutes late?

Ask the Coach with Richard Prause

Episode #7 (1:51) - How to begin a match and what to do if you realize that a tactic does not work.

Upcoming ITTF Coaching Courses in the U.S.

Here’s the schedule. Here’s the current listing:

ITTF Development and Education 2014 Review, 2015 Preview

Here’s the video (7:22) that outlines

Fang Bo Fifth Person on Chinese Core Team

Here’s the article from Tabletennista. He joins the “Big Four” - Ma Long, Zhang Jike, Xu Xin, and Fan Zhendong.

Ma Long and Coach Liu Guoliang Impromptu Exhibition

Here’s the video (21 sec).

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.

Statue Pong

Here's a very serious Julius Caesar following through on a big forehand.

Hard-working Umpire Has a Great Fall

Here’s the video (58 sec, including slo-mo replay).

“The hard-working umpire sat on a wall,
 The hard-working umpire had a great fall,
 All the spectators and the two playing men,
 Helped put the umpire back on the wall again.”

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