Spring Break Camp - Grip Problems

Once again it's obvious that the biggest problem when working with beginning juniors is the grip. If they get the grip right, the rest of their strokes tend to come together. But no matter how many times you correct it, about half of beginning juniors will immediately go back to whatever weird-fangled grip they were using, leading to weird-fangled strokes that can drive a coach to dark, weird-fangled places as they try to keep smiling as they correct the grip for the zillionth time.

A poor playing stance usually leads to a poor grip, and a poor grip often leads to a poor playing stance. Most kids can fix one problem at a time, but here you have to correct two problems at once. If the kid fixes one problem but not the other, he'll almost immediately unfix the first problem and go back to the bad grip or stance, since you have to fix both together. It's a difficult cycle to break out of.

I spent much of yesterday working with five beginners, ages roughly 7-9. Three are picking things up pretty fast. Two are not. These two are still falling back into these bad habits. One insists on using sort of a "claw" grip, where he faces the table perfectly square on his forehand shots, grabbing the racket with his index finger up the middle, and his other fingers wrapped tightly around the edges in a way that tightens his forearm. Until I can get him to turn at least slightly sideways, it's going to be difficult for him to develop a real forehand. The other has limp-wristitis, where he flops his wrist all over the place on all his shots. He doesn't seem to want to fix the problem, but I'll keep trying.

Tip of the Week

Importance of Constant Competition.

Spring Break Camp

In Friday's blog I mentioned that we have so many coaches/practice partners that we can't always use them all. Actually, it looks like that was incorrect - they will all be used in our camps, either coaching, feeding multiball, or as practice partners.

Day One starts this morning. As usual, I do all the talking, introducing the camp and giving short lectures. However, unlike our summer camps, where we have a lot of out-of-towners, the Spring Break Camp is mostly locals (since it coincides with the local spring break), and so the lectures will be extra short, with the goal to get them out on the tables. I'll probably be feeding multiball in the morning, working with beginners in the afternoon.

Mornings are mostly multiball. I'll be feeding multiball, along with coaches Cheng Yinghua, Jack Huang, and Wang Qing Liang ("Leon"), and perhaps one other. If not feeding multiball, then Chen Bo Wen ("Bowen") and Chen Jie ("James") will be practice partners for players waiting their turn at multiball. (We have other part-time coaches - not sure yet of their hours.) In the afternoon, it's mostly table play, with the first half drills, then games. I'll be taking the beginners to the back tables to work on basics (and then games near the end), while Cheng and Jack run the session for the rest, with the others as practice partners.

Bar-T Exhibition

As noted in my blog yesterday, I did three hours of demonstrations and exhibitions at a health fair at a Bar-T yesterday. The location was about 200 yards from MDTTC, about a 3-iron shot away! They already had a table, so we physically carried over 14 barriers to create a playing court. I did all the talking, giving short intros, then stroke and footwork demonstrations, exhibitions, and then challenges from the audience (sometimes hitting around, sometimes playing games, and sometimes challenging them to return serves). We went through this routine every 30 minutes. My hitting partners were 2500 player Chen Bo Wen ("Bowen") the first half, and 2600 player Wang Qing Liang ("Leon") the second half. John Hsu stayed the entire time to give out flyers and talk to potential players.

The actual turnout was not as great as I'd have hoped. When we do exhibitions for schools we typically get a gymnasium full of kids. (And we have plans now for doing a round of exhibitions at local schools - more on that when it comes up.)

One ironic moment - for one of our "shows," we only had about ten people watching. And then all but one had to suddenly had to leave - it turned out it was time for the belly dancing demo at the health fair, and all of them were either belly dancers or watchers! So we cancelled that segment and hit with the one viewer who remained, and others who came by shortly after. It's the first time in my 37 years in table tennis that I've ever lost an audience to belly dancing. Has this happened to you?

Exhibition and Demo

This morning I'm doing a three-hour exhibition and demo (9:30AM-12:30PM) at a local Bar-T. They are devoted to "...after-school childcare, summer day camps, outdoor education, corporate team building and events." My exhibition partner will be Chen Bo Wen ("Bowen") and Chen Jie ("James"), though I'm not sure if both are coming. Also helping out will be John and Wen Hsu, who will set up and run an MDTTC booth to answer questions, give out brochures, etc. I'll be doing most of the talking as we go through one demo after another for three hours. 

Roughly speaking, every 30 minutes or so I'll give a short intro on table tennis, give a demo on the shots, play a "challenge" exhibition match, then take on challenges and answer questions, especially about local table tennis. Then repeat, six times in all.

I've done a zillion of these. As usual, I'll bring my big and mini-rackets; a clipboard; a trick racket where a ball-sized hole has been cut out, with the hole refilled so when my opponent smashes I can push it out and then hold up the racket as if the ball put the hole in it; and a few others. I'll do the 50-foot curving serve from the side; blow the ball over the net, and there'll be lots of lobbing, including while lying on the ground or sitting in a chair. However, the most important aspect is the basic shot-making, where we demonstrate how table tennis can be played.

Want to do an exhibition to promote table tennis? Contact your local schools or other organizations. Many already have tables. Make sure to have something to offer new players - a junior program, or some other coaching program.

Fairness Versus Progressive Issues Revisited

In my blog yesterday I wrote about "USATT: Fairness Versus Progressive Issues." I had an email discussion with someone who believed that it would be interpreted by the average reader as criticism of the current Chair of the USATT Board of Directors, Mike Babuin. To anyone who read it that way - Poppycock!!! Mike was only voted in as Chair at the December board meeting, and his first meeting as chair will take place in April.

It could be read as criticism of past leaders. Some of them left USATT better than when they arrived, and some left it worse. There are many "Fairness" issues that they might have resolved, for the betterment of the sport. What no past leaders has done is find a way to either dramatically grow the sport or consistently develop players that can compete with the best players in the world. The point of my blog was that nearly every past USATT leader got bogged down in the "Fairness" issues, and so weren't able to focus on "Progressive" issues. It is a nasty cycle I hope will come to an end.

What are the progressive issues USATT could focus on? I've argued strongly for two specific ones: a nationwide system of leagues, and more junior training centers.

USATT: Fairness Versus Progressive Issues

For many years I've advised and argued that USATT leaders need to divide issues into two types, which I call "Fairness Issues" and "Progressive Issues." Both are important.

Fairness issues are those that involve the ongoing governance of the sport. They include setting up procedures for selecting teams; most membership issues; the running of the U.S. Open and Nationals and other similar events (including site selection, dates, choosing personnel, etc.); disciplinary actions; the magazine and website (which can be used to promote progressive issues, but are not progressive issues themselves); and many more. These issues take up the great majority of the time for USATT leaders. Look over the agenda or minutes for any USATT board meeting, and it's dominated by such issues.

Progressive issues are those that grow the sport. There are many different opinions on how this should be done, such as junior development programs (both elite and grass roots), leagues, schools, TV, growing the U.S. Open and Nationals, professional circuits, etc. It also includes raising money for the sport, if the money is used in progressive ways.

The problem is that Fairness issues take up an inordinate amount of time. They are often timely, and so leaders feel they get priority over Progressive issues. They often take a lot of time. And so they dominate the agenda, while progressive issues are regularly left out.

Tip of the Week

Dummy Loops.

$16,700 Cary Cup Championships

It's been a long journey. I left for the Cary Cup Championships in North Carolina, five hours drive away last Thursday morning, going down with Tim Boggan, who drove down from New York. (After the tournament he and his wife, who met him there on Sunday, go on vacation in various locations down there.) Tim had some early problems in that his credit card stopped working, most likely because he was suddenly using it in Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina, when he usually uses it in New York. But he's traveled extensively, using the credit card all over, and he said this had never happened. I had to put his hotel room for the first night on my credit card.

Here's the Cary Cup Championships web page, which includes complete results.

One major thing that jumped out at me this tournament was that the Maryland players who had played in recent tournaments tended to do well, while those who hadn't played tournaments in a while didn't do so well. This is actually an ongoing thing, as all the training in the world doesn't make up for a lack of "tournament toughness." When you play lots of tournaments, you get used to tournament pressures, to adjusting to different serves and playing styles, and to figuring out what serves and rallying shots you should use against various players. Players who hadn't played tournaments since, say, the Nationals in December didn't seem to have this tournament toughness, and it showed, especially in return of serve.

No More Blogs Until Monday - Cary Cup

I'll be leaving with Tim Boggan to drive down to the Cary Cup Championships around 4AM or so on Thursday morning, so no more blogs until next Monday. I'm helping with a clinic they are running on Thursday afternoon, then I play the hardbat event Friday morning, then I coach the rest of the way.

Fake Motions on Serves

One of the most under-utilized techniques is fake motions on serves. Most players have their racket move in a straight line from Point A to Point B, and since it doesn't take Ph.D. level geometry to read the spin if the racket goes in a straight line, the serve loses much of its effectiveness. It's like putting a big sign on your head before each serve that tells your opponent what the spin is going to be.

Instead, try two things. First, move your racket through a semi-circular motion so that the spin varies, depending on where the contact point is. At the highest levels players do this motion so fast and in such a short motion that few can even see the changing direction. There's a reason why, for example, a forehand pendulum serve is called a "pendulum" serve - the racket goes through a curving pendulum motion, and you get different spins depending on where on the curving path you contact the ball. Contact it early on the downswing, it's backspin; a split second later, it's side-backspin; a split second later, sidespin; a split second later, side-topspin; a split second later, it's topspin.

Tennis and Table Tennis

I used to play tennis regularly, going to the Quince Orchard Swim and Tennis Club for group training sessions. But it took up a lot of time and money, and I finally stopped about three years ago. Last night I had an urge to play, and so signed up for the 7-8 group session. It's a full-time center, with five tennis courts and a huge swimming pool. Each is contained in a huge "bubble," which comes down during the summer. (I hate when the bubble comes down, and we're stuck playing outside, in the sun, heat, and wind. If tennis were meant to be played outside, there'd have been tennis courts in the Garden of Eden, right?)

While I was paying for the session in the front lobby area, a kid walked up to me and said, "Hi Coach Larry!" I didn't recognize him at first, but I finally figured out he was Kevin, one of the kids in my Sunday junior session. Outside of a table tennis environment I hadn't recognized him at first. Then a man came up to me and asked if I also taught tennis. Again, I didn't recognize him outside the table tennis club, but he was the father of another player in one of my group sessions; his son or daughter was presumably out playing tennis or swimming. We chatted for a few minutes, where I explained I was just a player at the tennis center. When I went out on the tennis courts at 7PM, guess who was sitting next to the next court, watching his son take a tennis lesson? Stephen Yen, a local 2300 player! That's three separate table tennis people I ran into there in the course of a few minutes.

Tip of the Week

Practicing for the Big Matches.

Daylight Savings Time

Daylight Savings Time took a bite out of a Sunday morning practice session. I coach a six-year-old on Sundays from 10-11AM. Because of DST, that was like 9-10AM. Still not too early, right? After all, kids get up much earlier than that for school, right? Well, not in this case. I think the kid was used to staying up a little later on Saturday night, and his sleep clock was way off. When he came out to play, he was half asleep - literally. A few minutes into the session he put his head on the table and either went to sleep, or at least closed his eyes for a minute. I got him up, but a few minutes later he did it again. I had him splash water on his face to wake up - it did the trick for a few minutes. Then he sort of stood up, closed his eyes, and seemed to fall asleep standing up. Anyway, the first thirty minutes of the session were more or less alternate practice and sleep, practice and sleep. Then he woke up.

He actually had a pretty good second half. For his age, he's developed a pretty good backhand, can even smash pretty hard. (I have to get him to slow down.) On the forehand he tends to face the table without rotating his shoulders, and this also leads to an awkward grip. So we spent much of the second half shadow practicing this properly, and though he at one point put his head on the table again for a short nap, he got the forehand right. Near the end he was smacking forehands pretty well, including 22 in a row at one point - and he's hitting them pretty hard. Not bad for a six-year-old who is very small for his age - he looks about four. We also did some serve practice.