July 21, 2011

Deliberate Practice to deliberately become good or great

So you want to be good at table tennis? Then learn about Deliberate Practice. Not everyone can put in 10,000 hours and be great, but if you apply the other seven principles in whatever practice time you have (make time), you can really improve. And the hours do add up. Below are the eight main principles; the article elaborates on them. Why not print out the article's eight main points with short explanations (they'll fit on one page), and put it on your wall where you can see them regularly?

1. Deliberate practice is highly demanding mentally, requiring high levels of focus and concentration.
2. It is designed specifically to improve performance—to strengthen it beyond its current levels.
3. It must continue for long of periods of time.
4. It must be repeated.
5. It requires continuous feedback on results.
6. Pre-performance preparation is essential.
7. It involves self-observation and self-reflection.
8. It involves careful reflection on performance after practice sessions are completed.

The back doctor

Yesterday I saw an orthopedist sports medicine doctor about my recurring upper back problems. They did x-rays and some other tests. It turns out it's probably not a disc problem; he thinks it's a muscle problem, where the muscle attaches to the backbone. I'm supposed to meet with a physical therapist twice a week, probably starting next week, plus a series of exercises on my own that they'll assign. They are also hoping I can take one month off from table tennis. So tentatively, after our last August training camp at MDTTC (which ends Aug. 19), I might hire locals to act as a hitting partner for when I'm coaching so I can rest the back for that month. Even feeding multiball is painful, especially when feeding backspin.

Different Types of Table Tennis

This is from the Fun and Games section. Bet you didn't know there were this many types of table tennis! (And yes, that's me playing clipboard table tennis at the end.)

• Cylindrical table tennis. I think it rolls while you play.
• Circular table tennis
• Circular mini-table tennis.
• Three-way circular table tennis. But yellow surface and pink legs?
• Four-way octagonal table tennis. Yes, let's go play polypong!
• Hexagonal table tennis
• Twisted table tennis
• Hyperbolic table tennis
• Door table tennis
• Concrete table tennis
• More concrete table tennis
• Curving mirror table tennis
• I don't even know what type of a ping-pong table this is
• Let's just call it demonic table tennis and leave it at that
• Table tennis conference table
• Water table tennis
• Laptop table tennis
• Clipboard table tennis

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