June 9, 2015

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.

• Here’s video (2:41) that just came out on what appears to be some French TV station.
• Here’s a page with a story, pictures, and link to video (1:49) of her playing in 2013.
• Here’s a video (1:30) of her playing English table tennis star Matthew Syed.
• Here’s an iPhone commercial (30 sec) featuring Serena and Venus Williams playing table tennis.
• Here’s a picture from 2012 of her playing Mrs. Met, a New York Mets mascot.
• Here’s a picture of her playing at an airport on the way to Wimbledon.
• Here’s an article that links to pictures of her and Venus Williams playing table tennis at the 2013 Australian Open.

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