October 12, 2015

Tip of the Week

Back Foot Position on Forehand.

Sunday Coaching and Capclave

On Sunday I had two hours of private coaching and three hours of group coaching. In the adult training session, much of the focus was on hitting or looping down the line, especially with the forehand. After doing that down both lines, I had the players do side-to-side footwork where one player hit or looped forehands, alternating between crosscourt and down the line, while the other alternated forehands and backhands. I remember from David Sakai from years of drilling with him in the early 1980s that if you can play aggressively down the line, then you can play anywhere. It's a shorter distance, and once you master it, you've mastered the shot.

We also did a lot of serve practice. I had them do a lot on fast no-spin serves, which are especially effective to the middle (elbow). (Here's my Tip of the Week, Fast No-Spin Serves to the Middle.)

In the beginning junior class, we introduced them to up-down tables. This is where the players (ten of them) go on five tables, and each played a game to 11. (No deuce – 11-10 wins to save time.) When all are done, the winners move up, the losers move down, with the winner on the first table and the loser on the last table staying there. (I had an impromptu vote on whether we should call whoever loses the "loser" or "runner-up." It was 10-0 to call them "losers." So losers it is!)

In the two private coaching sessions, things were sort of reversed – one needed lot of work on the backhand, the other on the forehand. So we did a bit of saturation training on those.

On Friday night and all day Saturday I was away at the annual Capclave Science Fiction Convention in Gaithersburg, MD – coincidentally only 1.5 miles from MDTTC! (And there was "ping-pong" there - I'll get to that.) Once again I was a panelist – see the listing from my Friday blog. I also did a reading, where I read three humorous short-short stories, each about 5-7 minutes in length. The first one was "Manbat," about a bat that thought it was a superhero; the second was "A Meteor Will Kill You in Five Minutes," about what you do when a meteor is destine to kill you at a specific time, but not before, and so you and the meteor chat while you wait; and the third was "Happily and Righteously," a satire on paranoia that starred the now infamous "unimportant person who is no longer a part of this story." (The second and third of these are published in my anthology Pings and Pongs – along with 28 of my other published science fiction & fantasy stories. Buy it now so I can afford dinner tonight!)

Here are some pictures taken of me at some of the panels. You can't see it but there's a rather large audience for each. I'm wearing my button-up dress shirt covered with dragons. In front of me are displayed the three books I've written that fit under the science fiction & fantasy banner, including my table tennis fantasy The Spirit of Pong.

During my intro at the start of the panel on "Fiction with a Laugh Track" (i.e. humor in SF and fantasy), I was asked why the anthology was called "Pings and Pongs," and I briefly explained my table tennis background. Then the moderator of the panel asked if I could demonstrate. So I pulled out my smart phone – it's a tiny 2.5"x5" Moto E), and began bouncing a ping-pong ball on it. (Yep, I had one handy.) He then challenged me to keep doing it during all the panelist introductions, and so I did, for something like two minutes straight without a miss before I caught the ball to stop, as the audience laughed and clapped. I then told the crowd that at the end of the session I'd give a free copy of one of my books to anyone who could do this for 30 sec. No one could come close.

Today's going to be a really busy day. Besides doing the blog and Tip of the Week (and a dozen other things from my todo list) this morning, I'm coaching (and doing some tutoring) continuously from 12:45-7:00PM, then weight training (getting ready for the Nationals), and then a bunch of USATT and other work. 

USA Nationals – Enter Online!

Here's the USA Nationals page. There's now an Online Entry link. I just used it to enter – yep, I'll be playing at the Nationals! (But I'm retired from sponge play in tournaments, even though that's what I use and coach 99% of the time – I'll be coaching at the Nationals and playing hardbat and sandpaper events for fun. I'm doing some physical training to get in shape.)

Today's Coaching Articles

This morning there are a huge number of new coaching articles. It must be a full moon! (Or is that a full ping-pong ball in the sky?) Besides my Tip of the Week (above), here are seven more. I'm tempted to spread them out between today and tomorrow, but why wait? (And afterwards there are links to some great points!) Enjoy.

Effective Use of Timeouts

Here's the new coaching article from Han Xiao.

Omar Assar on Keeping a Routine

Here's the new coaching article from Matt Hetherington, where Egyptian star Assar (world #36) talks about setting up a table tennis training routine.

What I Learned from Winning Ugly

Here's the new article from Matt Hetherington, where he reviews Winning Ugly, one of the better sports psychology books out there. (Here are some of the better ones that I recommend.)

Tactical Drills

Here's the new coaching article from Samson Dubina.

Coaching Videos from Samson Dubina

Here's the new article, where he puts online four clips from his International Table Tennis Skills video: Slow-Motion Serve Demo, Backhand Loop Demo, Mini-Steps for Huge Improvement, and In-and-Out Footwork. (The four videos combine for about seven minutes.)

Vladimir Samsonov Tutorial - Table tennis Exercises for Beginner to Advanced

Here's the new coaching video (22:18) from the world #11 (at age 39!) and former #1.

Ask the Coach Show – They're Back!!!

Episode #170 (30:10) – How to Do a pendulum Topspin Serve (and other segments).

Shanghai is the New National Men's Team Champion of China

Here's the article from Tabletennista.

Werner Schlager vs. Wang Liqin

Here's a truly great point between the two (27 sec).

Match Point in Slow-Mo

Here's the video (62 sec) of the last point of the quarterfinals of juniors in South Australia.

Xu Xin vs. Zhu Linfeng

Here's video (2:54) of a great point between these two lefties. The incredible point lasts 35 seconds, and then they show it in slow motion.

Men's Final at Chinese Nationals: Xu Xin vs. Zhang Jike

Here's the video (9:50, with time between points removed).

Table Tennis Training – Wow!

Here's video (64 sec) of some crazy good players in training.

Robot Playing Live Table Tennis

Here's video 1:27) of this robot at some show where the robot can rally live with us humans. I've linked to previous such videos, but I think they keep getting better and better.

Michael Landers Prepares for the Dirty Dozen at Spin NY

Here's the video (11 sec).

That's a Big Paddle

Here's the picture. Yeah, it's big. Really big. (Here's the non-Facebook version.)

Ghostly Pong

Here's a repeating gif image of two ghosts playing table tennis! Why not put this on your club's web page?

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