February 16, 2016

Tip of the Week
Improving Side-to-Side Reaction.

Exhibitions and Demos
Friday and Saturday were exhausting as I did exhibitions and demos. Sunday was just as bad as I spent nearly the entire day at the club coaching. Sunday was also the 19th consecutive day I'd coached, so I was exhausted before all this. Fortunately, I got a bit rested up by taking Monday off – President's day. (Plus we had about five inches of snow.)

The Potomac Community Center (which is home to the Potomac Country Table Tennis Club), has a Club Friday, where hundreds of kids show up for various sports, games, and other activities. We had a two-hour session there on Friday (7-9PM), with two others coming up on Feb. 26 and Mar. 11. A big thanks go to Herman Yeh (president of PCTTC who arranged things), and local volunteers Ernie Byles, Gary Schlager, Michael Clarke, Chris Clarke, and Zheng Kangmin.

We had half the big gym, with basketball on the other half, with a huge curtain lowered between us. We were on the far side, which made it a bit more difficult to attract kids since they couldn't see us from the gym door. We probably had about 30-40 total kids, with a core group of about 20 that stayed pretty much the whole time.

Ernie and I started things off with a demo of the strokes, where I did the talking. The kids looked impatient, so we quickly went to some exhibition play, with Ernie doing lots of lobbing. Then I did one of my favorite shticks, where I told the audience that a terrible thing had happened, that after years of training, Ernie had gotten a big head, and now claimed that he could beat me!!! So we had a challenge game to 11, with the loser having to sweep and mop the club. (Well, so I claimed.) Anyway, we did the usual exhibition stuff, with me (as usual) playing the bad guy. (I tell them that whenever I win a point, they cheer; whenever Ernie scores a point, they boo; predictably, they do the reverse.)

Then we let them do open play on the tables with the many rackets and balls Herman had brought in. (We had nine tables.) The volunteers fanned out on the tables, hitting with the kids, while Gary did multiball on one of the tables. I was a roving coach.

On Saturday, the Maryland Table Tennis Center took part in Girls and Women's in Sports Day Expo at Westfield Montgomery Mall, with Wen Hsu organizing it for us. JOOLA volunteered to bring over a table and barriers, and at 10AM we set up in the mall in front of Sears. We stayed until 2PM, giving demos, and playing and coaching those interested, and giving periodic exhibitions. A big thanks goes to Wen Hsu, Jessica Lin (12, around 1900 level, who I did most of the demos with), Eileen Chang, and poor Nathan Hsu – he fractured his playing wrist playing basketball the day after the U.S. Olympic Team Trials, and is out for at least six weeks. However, he is about 1700 as a lefty, and can lob like a 2000 play! He was dying to play, so he ended up hitting almost as much as Jessica and me.

After it was done, I made a terrible mistake. It was 2PM, and there was a movie theatre there. I'd seen six of the eight Academy Award Nominees, with two of the ones I'd missed playing there – The Big Short and Brooklyn. Unfortunately, I'd just missed the 1:55PM showing of The Big Short, with the next showing at 4:50PM. So I wandered about the mall for 2.5 hours – and that was the mistake. My legs were dying before, and after all that walking, I could barely totter about. The movie was great, but I paid for it on Sunday, when I coached all day, and felt like I was 95 years old.

Advice for Coaches
Here's the new coaching article from Samson Dubina.

Ask the Coach
Episode #223 (23:45) - Defenders Receiving Tactics (and other segments)

One Thing to Take to Your Next Table Tennis Tournament
Here's the new article from Coach Jon.

ITTF Hopes Program
Parents and Coaches – If your child or student is an aspiring table tennis player with a birth date between Jan. 1, 2004 and Dec. 31, 2005, then the following should be of great interest to you.

National College Newsletter – Feb 2016
Here's the new one.

Jan-Ove Waldner: I Have No Motivation
Here's the interview.

GW Table Tennis
Here's the article and video (1:29) about this club at George Washington University in DC.

ITTF's Adam Bobrow Highlights Video
Here's the video (1:26) - When the voice of Table Tennis Adam Bobrow is not commentating, he is on the table playing!

ITTF Pongcast January 2016
Here's the video (10:17).

Town of Hempstead Salutes Estee Ackerman
Here's the video (2:12).

Ma Long vs. Dimitrij Ovtcharov – Left-handed!
Here's the video (9 sec).

Dimitrij Ovtcharov vs. Jan - Ove Waldner at the Energis Masters 2016
Here's the video (11:43) – some nice exhibition play!

Reggie Miller Plays Table Tennis

25,000 Ping Pong Balls
Here's the pictures – a perfect way to jazz up a small Brooklyn apartment!

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