USATT National Coaching Program Update
Here's the USATT news item on these big changes to our national team coaching system. If you are interested in applying as a coach for one of the National Teams – I believe these would include Men, Women, Junior Boys, Junior Girls, Cadet Boys, Cadet Girls, Paralympic - you need to apply by this Monday. I'll blog about this probably next week. (I'm putting this first because of that deadline. I may move this down later on.)

USATT Board of Directors Minutes and Illegal Hidden Serves
Our long national nightmare is over . . . the minutes to the USATT Board Meeting at the USA Nationals in December is finally up – four months later! So are the minutes to USATT Board Teleconferences in January and April. They are all linked from the USATT Minutes page.

Readers of this blog and anyone who's been paying attention to the sport knows about the problem we're having with illegal hidden serves. Our sport has developed a culture of cheating, where umpires allow players to illegally hide their serves, making receive very difficult, and giving the cheating player a big advantage. (Yes, hiding your serve to gain unfair advantage is cheating, and if you don't see that, you are in denial.) Nearly every major title at the USA Nationals, U.S. Open, and major events around the world are decided by illegally hidden serves. Because players cannot fairly compete when the umpire allows an opponent to hide their serves, nearly every top player, and now nearly every top cadet (under age 15) has been forced to learn to cheat hide their serve.

I've blogged about this many times. Here's my Dec. 28, 2015 blog where I both argued the case and gave examples, such as how 13-year-old Crystal Wang was cheated out of her quarterfinal match in Women's Singles at the Nationals because umpires allowed her opponent to blatantly hide her serve, even very publicly leaving her non-playing arm out to hide the serve – while Crystal serve very legally throughout. How can anyone watch this and not be sickened I'll never understand. But these are not isolated matches; it's happened in nearly every top-level match. This won't change until the leaders in our sport show leadership and fix the problem.

When a player learns to read the serve by watching contact, and then an opponent illegally hides contact and the umpire allows it, guess what? The player will struggle to read the serve, and will often look like an amateur. Or worse, they simply make very defensive returns, giving the illegal server an easy attack or put-away, and spectators get the false impression that the server isn't getting much of an advantage since the player is at least getting them back.

As I've argued many times, if an opponent cheats on his serve and the umpire allows it, then it's not cheating if you then do the same. Your opponent is serving illegally to gain an advantage, which is the definition of cheating; you are serving illegally only to nullify that advantage, plus the match in question is no longer being played under the laws of table tennis anyway. Some may nitpick this, but the gist is that we need to solve this problem so neither player is cheating.

Not every serve is hidden – most players learn that if you do that, then the opponent gets used to it. So they often go back and forth, hiding the serve perhaps a few times early to make sure the umpire will allow it and to build up an early lead, and then holding back until key points. Others do it nearly every point. Spectators often think the serve is visible because contact appears visible, when in fact the server often hides contact with his head, and then fakes contact underneath the head. The ball must be visible to the receiver throughout the serve. (Others just leave their non-playing arm out there and hide it with that, not even attempting to hide the cheating and practically challenging the umpires to call the blatantly illegal serve – and they rarely do. See Crystal match above, and many other matches at the last Nationals and the recent North American Olympic Trials.)

I've presented the board and officials numerous pictures and links to videos showing them the obvious, but our leaders have not shown the leadership to solve this problem. We could change the rules, as I've proposed with the Net Visibility Rule (which has an entire gallery of illegally hidden serves, and was presented to the USATT Board, Officials Committee, and Rules Committee to show examples of all the cheating going on), but even more important is the will to actually do the right thing, and enforce the rules. Until we do that, we'll reward the cheaters and cheat the non-cheaters.

What does all this have to do with the USATT minutes? If you go to the December minutes, and page down to page 8, you'll see where I made a motion:

Motion 6: It has come to the attention of the USATT Board of Directors that illegal hidden serves are being allowed, and that when umpires are not sure about the legality of a serve they often do not call them. This is unfair to their opponents. The Board would like to see the rules enforced as they are written.

Please read the minutes about the motion, and note that it lost by a vote of 1-6-1. Yes, I was the only one to vote for it. The plan was that with this motion (assuming it passed, which I thought was a no-brainer – silly me), was that we could then ask the referee of the upcoming Nationals to fulfill the Board's will, and let umpires and players know in advance that the rules would be enforced as they are written. Instead, we will have another Nationals where the rules will not be enforced, and cheating will continue to dominate our sport.

The night before the meeting I ran this by several board members, and they all seemed to agree with it. But then came the meeting. After I made the motion, a number amazing things occurred that are not in the minutes. Several USATT people argued that there is no evidence that players were hiding their serves or that umpires were not enforcing the rules. That's just astoundingly silly. I'd presented the board with lots of photographic evidence, but even that should not be needed – this has been an ongoing problem for several years, and for table tennis people to deny the very existence of the problem was bizarre. I once again presented to the board numerous pictures of prominent players hiding their serves at major tournaments – not cherry-picked serves, but in almost all cases their very first serve of the match – and these objections slowly went away.

Another argued that it didn't matter if the serves were illegal, all that mattered was what the serves looked like from the umpires' point of view, and that I hadn't presented those pictures. I pointed out that I had presented four pictures of hidden serves from the umpires' point of view. I then pointed out that if a player is cheating and the umpire doesn't see it, it's still cheating – it simply means he hasn't been caught. More importantly, the problem isn't that the umpires don't see it, it's that they aren't enforcing it. When a player hides his serve, umpires often point out that they can't really see if the serve is hidden or not, and so don't call it. That's the problem – the rules are very clear that if the umpire can't tell if the serve is legal, than the serve is illegal! (See rules below.)

Others argued that hiding one's serve isn't really cheating, that if the umpire isn't calling it, it isn't cheating. Please! (Do I need to dignify this with a serious answer? Among other things, see the Olympic oath from my Dec. 28, 2015 blog.)

I could write a book on the arguments against some of the points raised against the motion. For example, the argument that "this motion is unnecessary because umpires are already directed to fault all illegal serves as part of their job" is simply wrong. To start with, we know they are not calling the serves, so we know we need to act on this. Giving it lip service and then looking the other way doesn't help hard-working and conscientious umpires who face the fact that if they are the only ones enforcing the rules correctly, they will be singled out and ostracized. What's needed is for those in charge to make it 100% clear that umpires not enforcing the rules will not be acceptable, and let both umpires and players know in advance of the tournament that this will not be tolerated. I've proposed this to the Officials committee last year, suggesting that they notify umpires and players in advance of the Nationals (via email and info flyers in player packets) that the rules will be enforced, but no action was taken. With the board vote here, no action will be taken for the upcoming Nationals as well, alas.  

I mean, seriously – if the role of the umpire is to enforce the rules, is it too much to ask that they enforce the rules???

But it's almost unfair to ask an umpire to enforce the rules until they all do it, as a group. And that won't happen until they are directed, as a group, to do so – and then enforce it by calling out those who do not enforce the rules. This means action needs to come from the top – but that's not happening.

I could go on and on, but it's just too frustrating, seeing such blatant wrongs and knowing that the leaders of our sport will do nothing to resolve the issue. And so coaches, parents, and up-and-coming kids will continue to face the problem of whether to learn to cheat to compete. After the December board meeting I pretty much dropped all USATT activities for a month in disgust.

Often players who complain about illegal hidden serves are called hypocrites because they have been forced to do the same to compete. Sorry, I don't consider that hypocrisy, since they are trying to solve the problem while trying to compete in the culture of cheating they are forced to survive in. But the accusations are often enough to shut them up, and then those who don't want to deal with the problem have fewer people complaining.

What are the rules that are being broken? Pretty much all of the following:

2.06.04: From the start of service until it is struck, the ball . . . shall not be hidden from the receiver by the server or his or her doubles partner or by anything they wear or carry. 

2.06.05: As soon as the ball has been projected, the server’s free arm and hand shall be removed from the space between the ball and the net. 

2.06.06: It is the responsibility of the player to serve so that the umpire or the assistant umpire can be satisfied that he or she complies with the requirements of the Laws, and either may decide that a service is incorrect. 

2.06.06.01: If either the umpire or the assistant umpire is not sure about the legality of a service he or she may, on the first occasion in a match, interrupt play and warn the server; but any subsequent service by that player or his or her doubles partner which is not clearly legal shall be considered incorrect. 

One other clarification. Some officials have argued there is too much gray area in the rules to enforce. That's nonsense. They seem to believe that if they aren't sure if the serve is legal, then there's gray area, and they can't call it. WRONG!!! There is no gray area there, none whatsoever. The rules say if the umpire isn't sure about the serve, then the serve is illegal. Gray area occurs when the umpire is almost certain that the serve is legal (in this case visible), but not absolutely 100% sure. When players are hiding the ball behind their head or illegally leaving their arm out to hide the ball, there's no way an umpire can be "sure" these serves are legal. At most they can say they aren't sure, followed by a call of "Fault!" (Or a warning the first time.)

You can see other arguments made in the minutes, but only the bare gist of what took place as we argued for something like an hour over this - pretty much me against everyone else in the room (plus a few who simply didn't get involved). And so not one other board member would vote that we should follow our rules. It's pretty much the same as the steroids era in baseball, where everyone knew what was going on, but many still denied it or swept the problem under the rug, hoping it would go away on its own. Now we despise those who allowed it. How is that different than this? (The health issues of steroids is one difference, but not relevant. People don't despise Barry Bonds and other steroids cheaters because they risked their health; they despise them because they cheated for advantage, and they despise those who allowed it.)

I've been emailing with ITTF officials, and they are slowly working toward resolving the problem. Meanwhile, how many more kids and other players will train full-time, only to have their dreams – national titles, national teams, Olympic team – taken away because we allow their opponents to openly cheat? How many kids will be taught to cheat? Some argue that USATT should just stay out of it, that it's an ITTF problem. Sure, that's one way to deal with a problem, but ignoring it and hoping someone else deals with it. That's not how I operate. USATT should be a leader, not one that looks the other way and hopes others will fix our problems.

Oh, and just to be clear, just because I and many others believe we should not allow cheating doesn't mean we aren't trying to train players to deal with the problem, such as learning to return the illegally hidden serves they will inevitably face, due to umpires allowing it. Trying to end the cheating and teaching players how to deal with it are not mutually exclusive. (But it's not easy learning to return hidden serves unless you are in a club where the coaches openly teach such serves to their players, and so there are many players to practice against them.)

Now for the most sickening part. When USATT people were arguing that there is no evidence that players were hiding their serves or umpires not calling it, it was blatantly obvious to most in the room that this simply wasn't true – any serious table tennis person who has been paying attention knows this is a problem, with the only serious question as to how or whether to deal with it. So faced with these obviously false statements, how many others at the meeting other than myself spoke up against these false statements?

Zero. And I welcome any of them to comment below. And I'll finish with these words, often paraphrased in different ways and attributed to Edmund Burke, Plato, and others:

"All that is required for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing."

​The Ultimate Guide to Beating Your Workmates at Ping Pong
Here's the new coaching article from MH Table Tennis. Includes links to numerous videos.

Coaching and Tips from MyTableTennis.net
Here's their coaching section – a huge collection.

Ask the Coach Show
Episode #256 (18:35) - Training v competition (and other segments).

A Puzzlemaster's Pastime – Your Brain on Ping Pong
Here's the video (59 sec) featuring Will Shortz, New York Times Crossword Editor and Westchester TTC owner. "I'm fanatical about table tennis."

Table Tennis Notebooks
Here are pictures of these notebooks with TT racket pictures. And here's where they are on sale – in England, alas.

Playing Table Tennis with Special Items
Here's the video (2:35). (Yesterday I linked to a shortened version of this with just the shovel.)

Real Beer Pong?
Here's the picture!

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Rather Rare Shots
Yesterday in a coaching session with 14-year-old Matt, while practicing forehand counterlooping, I sidespin looped one extra wide to his forehand, drawing him out wide as it broke to the left (his right). He counterlooped, I counterlooped back to his middle forehand, and he was out of position - so he improvised and ripped (!) an inside-out backhand counterloop from the forehand side! The ball shot out to my wide forehand, curving away from me for an ace. I've seen the shot before, but only rarely - but very rarely, if ever, this fast, and with so much breaking sidespin. I dropped my racket in shock and told Matt that he had reached the pinnacle of his life, that for the rest of his life nothing he ever did would ever be at such a high level so that his life was now ruined, with nothing left to look forward to. (At the end of the session he insisted on trying the shot again, so we did a drill where he "practiced" the shot, and he pulled off two more, though not as good as the first one.)

I've played 40 years, and I've done almost the same shot - but not with speed, just a spinny but soft inside-out backhand counterloop. Now I have something to look forward to trying to do!

It got me thinking about other rarely used shots. Here are a few. 

• Inside-out backhand sidespin from wide forehand. See above!
• Switch hands shot. If you are drawn to your wide forehand and they then go to your wide backhand, every now and then a player will switch hands, either for the extra reach, or because it's sometimes easier to smash that way. Andrzej Grubba was the master of this, which was unfortunate as he may have had the best backhand in the world during his career (1980s and 1990s). 
• Seemiller backhand smash against lob. If you are caught playing backhand against a lob to the backhand, smack it in Seemiller style (i.e. rotate the racket so you use the forehand side on the backhand side). I've done this many times. 
• Fingertip reach grip shot. When you are caught off guard, holding the racket with your fingertips on the end of the handle gives you those extra few inches. I remember once playing David Zhuang, who caught me off guard with some super-short drop shots to my forehand off my serve - and not expecting that, I had to lunge in and extend the racket like this, and barely got the ball back. This happened several times! Yes, his drop shots were that tricky - he came in so fast they looked like he was pushing long or attacking. 
• Forehand pendulum serve shot from middle. When caught by a shot to the middle, I've seen players do this, and I've done it a few times. I remember the 6'4" Charles Butler used to do this sometimes, circa late 1970s.
• "The Snake," as demonstrated in this video (65 sec) by Adam Bobrow - where you sort of throw the ball up, but move racket rapidly side to side so opponent isn't sure which direction contact was made. (Sometimes you can do the contact so far below table level that the opponent doesn't even see contact.)
• Backhand sidespin chop, especially against a serve. I've seen Gal Alguetti throw this at people and they miss it over and over.

A 21^st Thing to Harp On
Yesterday I blogged about 20 things I constantly harp on with students. Dan Seemiller emailed me, and said the thing that he says about five times each night to his students is "more spin – quality spin." That's a good one, as far too many players don't understand the importance of creating great spin when serving, pushing, and looping.

Do you think Chinese athletes would still dominate table tennis if only Hard Bats were used?
Here's the poll at Pong Universe, and where you can comment.

Learn Table Tennis Backspin Serve - Part 3 - Like a Boss
Here's the new video (3:16) from Brett Clarke. (I wasn't able to find links to parts 1 and 2.)

ITTF Level 2 Course in India
Here's the video (12:51) created by one of the coaches in the ITTF coaching course ran by USA's Richard McAfee.

Ma Long - Visions of Destiny
Here's the new video (3:48) featuring the world champion and world #1.

Flash to the Past – Tibor Klampar and Gabor Gergely
Here's the video (2:55) showing these two Hungarian greats from the 1970s and 80s, and their playing techniques. I think it's in Hungarian, but it's interesting to watch, especially the slow motion parts. These two, along with Istvan Jonyer, were "The Three Musketeers" who battled with the Chinese for a decade, including beating them in the Men's Team Final at the Worlds in 1979.

Table Tennis - Nice Points Compilation 3
Here's the new video (6:44). Set to music and much of it in slow motion. Here's Compilation 1 (6:10) and Compilation 2 (5:47).

The Most Vicious Never-Ending Rally Ever
Here's the gif image!

A Little Around the Tables, Anyone?
Here's the video (35 sec).

Shovel Pong
Here's the video (29 sec) – what, you've never wanted to play with a shovel before?

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20 Things to Harp On
Here are some things I constantly harp on with students.

1. When forehand looping, contact is to the side of the body, not in front.
2. If you back off the table when looping, you'll probably be reaching for the ball in front of you instead of contacting it from the side with power.
3. If you are straining, something's wrong. Power should come easily from proper technique – think "easy power."
4. Step to the ball. Assume you will have to do so on every shot and be pleasantly surprised the few times you don't.
5. Balance is the secret to recovery, which is the secret to getting to the next ball.
6. The secret to a good push isn't doing anything great, but doing all of the following pretty well – quick, low, heavy, very deep or very short, angled, and with last-second changes of direction.
7. Loop the deep serve unless you have a reason not to. An inability to loop a deep serve may be a reason not to do so in a big match, but it mostly means you have to practice it.
8. The secret to super spinny serves is racket acceleration (not speed) and grazing contact.
9. You serve short by grazing the ball so there's little forward speed, not by slowing down your motion.
10. Practice your serves!
11. If you want to have a good receive, you need someone to serve to you over and over so you can practice your receive.
12. If you have a good grip and good foot positioning, everything else will usually fall into place.
13. You must develop at least one overpowering strength that opponents will fear while having no overpowering weaknesses that opponents can easily play into.
14. If you want to know what your weaknesses are, play a top player and ask him to make you look silly.
15. When fixing technique, it's often best to exaggerate the change.
16. Your attacks and most other shots (including receive) should go to the wide corners or opponent's middle (roughly his playing elbow).
17. If you have something that needs work, do practice drills that zero in on that weakness repeatedly.
18. In a match, focus on basic tactics, and then your mind won't wander or get nervous.
19. In tournaments or leagues, scout out unfamiliar opponents, either by watching him play (live or on video), or by asking about him.
20. Keep your sponge rubber clean.

Ask the Coach Show
Episode #255 (25:34) - Olympic qualification hots up (and other segments). (For some reason the picture doesn't show up for the first 25 seconds, but you get sound.)

Upcoming State Championships
This weekend is the Indiana State Championships! Here's the entry form.

History of U.S. Table Tennis, Vol. 17, Chapter 5
Here it is! (1989: Post U.S. Open Tournament Through July.) You can buy this or other volumes at TimBogganTableTennis.com.

How Ping-Pong Diplomacy Thawed the Cold War
Here's the recent article from history.com.

11 Questions with Pete May
Here's the USATT interview.

Top Players Find Their Ping-Pong Niche
Here's the article from the Santa Monica College Corsair.

Honolulu’s Michelle Wie hosts 3rd annual “Wie Love Ping Pong” event to benefit HSJGA
Here's the article.

Off The Table - Zhang Jike
Here's the ITTF interview (4:25).

Table Tennis Olympian's Career Began in Stanford University Laundromat
Here's the video (2:31) on Lily Zhang from NBC Bay Area. "My dad was a professor there. So every time we went to do laundry, and there was a table there, I played my parents for fun."

Making Your Mark: Ping pong bringing students together
Here's the video (2:58) from ABC 13 News.

Interview with Bohan Zhang, 2016 Butterfly Cary Cup Champion
Here's the interview (3:01) by Barbara Wei.

Interesting Point – Lobbing and Sidespin Chopping!
Here's the video (52 sec).

Kids Bouncing Balls Off Side of Table
Here's the video (46 sec) – this is harder than it looks, especially for kids!

Crazy Ping Pong in Bedroom With iPong Ball Machine
Here's the video (66 sec)!

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Trickshot Routine
Note to self: never, Never, NEVER spend an hour practicing a very physical trickshot routine (for the next ITTF Trickshot Competition) unless you are physically in great shape, and never attempt this at the age of 56. Oops, I just turned 56, AND I practiced a trickshot routine for an hour on Sunday night. Double oops.

I believe the next trickshot competition will be this fall, so I'm getting ready. I've worked out a top-secret routine that involves all of my best trick shots in one strange medley – balancing the ball in the air by blowing on it (sideways), tossing a ball in the air and smacking it in mid-air with another ball, backspin serve that comes back over the net, smacking objects from a distance, and the infamous 50-foot serve (from the side of the table, so the ball bounces on both sides). The problem is that the routine happens so rapidly that it's pretty physical – and you'd be surprised how tiring it is to do these same shots over and over. And then we get to the 50-foot serve – now that is exhausting. Near the end of the hour I couldn't actually do it anymore as my arm was just too tired, and I couldn't make the distance. So I continued practicing, but only faked the 50-foot serve for a time, though I got back to doing it at the very end.

I probably did the routine 200-300 times in the hour, and managed to pull the entire thing off three times. But now I'm toying with going in a different direction, where I focus on something more specific, rather than a routine that combines all these "skills." I've got a few options, but they are top secret. Since I regularly demonstrate in classes various trick serves, where I make the ball spin and curve like a puppet, I might go in that direction. But others have done this type of thing, so it'll have to be something pretty original. Or I might incorporate another trick I've recently mastered, tossing a ball into the air and smacking it with another. (Seriously, I can do this consistently now! Ask me to demo at the club or tournament.) But that alone won't be enough.

The aftermath of Sunday night's workout is my arm is a bit sore – not as bad as I'd thought it might be – but my whole body feels like it spent an hour doing all sorts of highly physical things it wasn't used to doing – which is exactly what happened. I've got sore muscles that I didn't know existed. I actually feel like I just ran a marathon! (Which I did – back in 1977, age 17, an age where one recovers much more quickly.)

During my 2.5 hours of coaching last night I was exhausted, though I made sure it only minimally affected my play. I was counterlooping for ten minutes with one kid, and near the end I could barely get my arm to move – so he got to go up against my fishing instead. I can already tell my body is going to be tired today, and I've got another 2.5 hours today.

So when do I practice these trick shots? I long ago decided I didn't want to do this in public, with everyone gathering around to watch. So I've been doing it late the last two Sunday nights, since The Walking Dead season is over, and Game of Thrones doesn't start until this upcoming Sunday. (Sunday nights is sort of my TV night – the rest of the week I mostly have it on news.) So when will I practice it? Probably any other night of the week, after the club closes. But it'll be top secret until the time comes!

Ask the Coach Show
The show returns tomorrow with a new show. Meanwhile, I discovered that back on April 3, besides episode 251, they had a "B" show that I didn't link to – so here it is.

• Episode #251B (12 min) - Power of Practice Winners Announcement

Top Europe Table Tennis Stars Qualify for Rio 2016
Here's the article and listing.

Timo Boll: "There’s Nothing Better for Me"
Here's the interview with the German superstar.

ITTF Opens up Bidding for Revamped 2017 ITTF World Tour
Here's the ITTF press release. If only USATT had lots of money…

Researchers Find Ping-Pong Can Slow Effects of Dementia & Alzheimer's
Here's the video (2:51) on "Table Tennis Therapy" from CBS 13.

Interview with Ann Campbell, Triangle TTC President
Here's the video interview (3:41) by Barbara Wei.

Pong Court on TV?
Here's the notice – "A prospective weekly TV series in which bitter rivals face off across a ping-pong table to resolve long-standing disputes – winner take all." The filming is at the Westchester TTC in NY, Monday, April 25, at 7PM. Free admission. (I think this is for real, though I'm slightly suspicious. But it's a fun idea.)

Incredible Rally with More Incredible Finish
Here's the video (38 sec).

Centaur Pong
Here's the picture!

Non-Table Tennis: "The Nature of Swords"
I just sold the story to Galaxy's Edge, one of the top "pro" markets, my fourth sale to them. The story is in the distant future, where mankind has died out, and all that are left are the magical swords they had created. The swords are intelligent and can fly about, and spend their carefree days sparring with each other and reminiscing about their former human masters – until one day one of them sets out to explore the world and investigate the fate of humanity. Galaxy's Edge is edited by Mike Resnick, 5-time Hugo winner and record 37-time nominee for his writing. 

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Tip of the Week
Shot Awareness in Practice.

Chinese School Exhibition
On Saturday I did an exhibition/demonstration at a Chinese school at Rocky Hill Middle School. My partner for the exhibition was Lisa Lin, rated 1919, a member of the USA Hopes Team (top four under 12 at time of trials), who had just turned 12. I'd spoken to her briefly on Friday about what we'd do, since it was her first exhibition, and pointed out that between the two of us we'd done about 500 exhibitions. 

I gave my usual talk about table tennis being a game of strokes, footwork, and spin; how it was an Olympic sport; and emphasized how China dominates, since it was a Chinese school. We demonstrated forehands, backhands, footwork, and a multiball demonstration where Lisa did lots of footwork. I also explained spin, and demonstrated a backspin serve that bounced back into the net, and a sidespin serve where I served to the left, and the ball spun sideways and hit a conveniently placed paddle off to the right. 

Then I got into my "sad story" routine, where I explained how a terrible thing had happened, that after years of training, Lisa had gotten a "big head," had gotten conceited - and in fact had told me that very morning that she could beat me!!! So to settle it once and for all, we were going to have a challenge match, with the loser sweeping and mopping the gymnasium that night. 

A game to 11 is too short for a good exhibition, so we played to 15, with the school principal umpiring. We had lots of great rallies, including one standout one where we smacked backhands back and forth for about 30 shots, with me grunting loudly each time. At various times I pulled out the big racket, the mini-racket, and a clipboard; did the 50-foot serve, the blowing-the-ball-over-the-net serve, the come-back-over-the-net backspin serve, the "Look over there, Lisa!" serve (where I serve as she looks away), the fake high-toss serve (where I toss a ball way up in the air, and then quick serve with another ball), and the toss-the-ball-under-one-leg, serve-under-the other serve. Oh, and lots of lobbing, including a nice one where I was rolling about on the ground. 

Throughout I'm bantering continuously with the audience, mocking Lisa (and always paying for it), and even doing the "first table tennis wave in history" (for about the 500th time). We battled back and forth, and had five deuces, but in the end (as I'd promised Lisa), she won 21-19. 

We then invited players to come up and try to return spin serves, with others directed to catch the returns that predictably went to the side - the kids always are amazed at this. 

Afterwards, they asked if I would be available to teach a regular class on Saturdays - and though I'm rather jammed for time these days, I (tentatively) agreed. So I might be teaching there starting in a few weeks, though they have to first organize it. 

USA Nationals Event Listing
Here's the list, with times and days. The Nationals will be held July 4-9 in Las Vegas. (Yes, for those not paying attention, they've flipped the Nationals and Open – the Open will be in Las Vegas in December. This is so kids can attend the Nationals – when it was held in December it conflicted with their school finals.)

Table Tennis Coach Needed
Here's the notice from the Alameda Club in California.

New Look for Table Tennis' Hottest Social App: PongUniverse Gets a New Look!
Here's info from MH Table Tennis.

Ajmer Proves Successful Home for India's Second Ever Level Three Course
Here's the ITTF article on the coaching course run by USA's Richard McAfee.

Stay Young – with Help from Table Tennis!
Here's the BBC article.

The Amazing Story of Ibrahim Hamato - Impossible is Nothing
Here's the video (1:41). You've probably seen video of the armless Egyptian star, who plays with a racket in his mouth and is often invited to big tournaments where the top players line up to hit with him. Now you can learn more about him. (He lost both arms at age 10 in a train accident.) Here's his Wiki page.

Amazing rally at 2016 French National Championships!
Here's the video (48 sec).

Monarch Bank Battle of the Paddles School and Scholarship Ping Pong Event
Here's the video (62 sec).

The Best Spots in D.C. for Dates 1, 2 and 3
From the Washington Post on Friday, under "SECOND DATE: Have a drink, mixed with some friendly competition," it has the following: 

The Park View spot starts serving beer, wine and cocktails at 5 p.m. (except on Sundays, which are dry). Grab a drink and a light snack at the bar and, once you’re ready, venture upstairs for table tennis. You can make the game a little more interesting by turning it into a challenge: Every time someone loses a point, he or she shares a fact about themselves. For example, I learned that a recent date is one of eight kids, enjoys taking baths and, as a child, thought he would play professional basketball. Offering up random facts can be a nice change of pace from volleying questions back and forth, like on a regular first or second date. If your date is a sore loser or a total dud, you can call it a game, set, not a match and part here. 

Pong Head
Here's the picture!

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Thursday Beginning Junior Class
We started a new seven-week session of the Thursday class, which is 6-7 PM – though in reality we tend to go an extra 20 or so minutes each time, since the kids are so enthusiastic and it's my last coaching of the day, so I'm free. The new session has a small group of just seven, including two returnees from last session, but it's already looking like one of the best groups to work with. It's also a somewhat older group than in the past, ranging from 11 to 15. But all seven are gung-ho about table tennis – not a slacker in the group!

When I say "slacker," that means two types of players that can really hurt a group session. One is the type who doesn't really want to play, doesn't want to be there, treats it like work, and keeps asking, "How much longer?" The other is the goof-off, who won't take anything serious, and refuses to try or learn – they just smack balls around however they want to. Both of these types can hurt the group as their behavior can spread to others.

But there are no slackers in this group!

Six of the seven have obviously played some before, and knew how it was supposed to be played – they all could hit decent forehands and backhands. One is more of a beginner, playing "basement" style where he mostly patted the ball back with his backhand; forehands were a novelty for him. But he's picking it up.

After the session officially ended I spent about 15 minutes serving to them as they tried to return my spin and speed serves. As I tell them, either they are going to look silly or I am, since I'll serve a sidespin, and quickly put my paddle down and move to the side to catch the ball. Usually the ball is rather there, but every now and then they'll get a serve back, and then I look silly – and they live for that. But usually I'll say things like, "This ball is very thirsty," and I'll give them a tomahawk serve so their return goes to the water fountains to the right. Or I'll say, "This ball is very lonely," and serve so they put the ball to my left, where I have the big box of balls. Or I'll make them absolutely promise not to put the next ball into the net, which they inevitably do as I serve backspin. All this serving whets their appetite for more, and I promise them I'll teach them spin serves later on.

I also demonstrated the new "Trick Shot" routine I'm working on for the next ITTF Trick Shot Competition – I'd love to tell you about it, but then someone might steal my ideas! Let's just say it's a growing routine as I keep adding more elements to it.

Back Problems and The Impossible Dream
Yesterday I wrote about and posted a link to Jim Nabors on the old Gomer Pyle TV show (1964-69) singing "To Dream the Impossible Dream." Here's the link again (3:52). The song got me thinking about my past hopes and dreams.

When I was a kid I always dreamed of having back problems. Sure, I knew the odds were stacked against me. But still I dreamed, and I worked toward my goal, year after year, always seeking the advice of the best bad back coaches and putting in the extra effort. Many doubted me but I did not give up. And then, a few years ago, after decades of striving, I accomplished the goal of excruciating back problems. They were so painful that people carried my playing bag around for me, partly because I could barely lift it, but mostly in awe and perhaps a little jealousy of what I had accomplished. I spent many wonderful hours with a physical therapist as we gloried in my feat – though I soon learned she was scheming against me, determined to take away my achievement. Glory is fleeting, and the back problems soon left, thanks to treachery of this malicious therapist. However, I did not give up, and recently it flared up again, forcing me to cancel a number of coaching sessions as I once again reveled in my achievement. But like all athletes, decline inevitably comes with age, and once again the back problems are going away. Perhaps someday they'll be the just fading memory of an old man reminiscing about his glory days, but nothing will ever completely remove those vivid memories of a knife stuck in my back and jiggled about.

How to Play Table Tennis in Ten Days
Here's this excellent guide (with links to video) from Expert Table Tennis. It has ten sections:

1. Grip
2. Stance
3. Footwork
4. Forehand Drive
5. Backhand Drive
6. Backhand Push
7. Forehand Push
8. Serve
9. Return of serve
10. Match Play

Table Tennis Training – Tips for Parents
Here's the new article from Expert Table Tennis.

Tactical Training has a major contribution in Table Tennis
Here's the coaching article, apparently from a blogging coach in India.

Indian Coverage of Richard McAfee's ITTF Courses
Here's some Indian press about the classes, with pictures. Wrote Richard, "Our ITTF Courses in India have generated some good press around the country. Here is an article from the National Newspaper." Can anyone read . . . um . . . Indian? (I'm pretty sure that's Hindi.)

School Ping Pong Clubs Create ‘Battle of Paddles’ Event, Scholarships
Here's the article about Virginia Beach high schools: "Local High Schools will be competing in the first annual Monarch Bank Battle of the Paddles School Ping Pong and Scholarship Events this Saturday, April 16th."

Asian and European Qualifications for Rio Olympics 2016
Ma Long vs Fan Zhendong - Final (4:47). Here are links to other matches. Here are links to European Qualification matches and the European Olympic Qualification home page.

International Table Tennis
Here's my periodic note (usually every Friday) that you can great international coverage at TableTennista (which especially covers the elite players well) and at the ITTF home page (which does great regional coverage). Butterfly also has a great news page.

Octopus Pong!
Some of these I've posted before, but some are new. Enjoy!

• Unbelievable video (34 sec) of Octopus playing four players (Betfair ad). Brilliant!
• Another version (22 sec) of the Octopus ad above (Betfair ad).
• Still image from octopus playing four players ad.
• Computerized 3-D octopus playing table tennis.
• German Octopus Pong cartoon. Translated caption is, "You've won again - 21 to zero. And now I have no more pleasure!"
• Octopus, swordfish, dolphin, crocodile, killer whale, shark, and turtle all playing.
• Seven-paddle octopus and shirt.
• Eight-paddle octopus vs. rabbit.
• Five-paddle octopus and shirt.
• Seven octopus playing TT color drawings.
• Octopus table tennis rubber #1.
• Octopus table tennis rubber #2.
• Octopus paddle #1.
• Octopus paddle #2.
• Octopus paddle #3.
• Octopus paddle #4.

Mostly Non-Table Tennis: Publicity for Campaign 2100: Game of Scorpions
Here are various blogs and interviews with me or about my SF novel Campaign 2100: Game of Scorpions. But if you'd prefer my table tennis books, here they are!

• Literary Escapism by Jackie M. (04-12-16) – an interview with General Feodora Zubkov, and character in the novel!
• Aspiring Authors Unite by Michael Laventrella (04-03-16) – interview with me.
• Hanging Out, Reading Books, Telling Tales blog by Em Shotwell (03-08-16) – interview with me.
• Live to Read blog by Krystal Larson (03-18-16) – the Big Ideas in the novel.
• Eating Authors blog by Lawrence Schoen (03-07-16) – about my most memorable meal – and it's all table tennis!
• Campaign 2100: Game of Scorpions book trailer (81 sec) by Nathan Hsu (03-07-16)
• Amazon Reviews (4) – all very positive, with three 5-star reviews and one 4-star.

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MDTTC Media Coverage and the Washington Post
Since 2012 I've been keeping careful track of MDTTC media coverage, with 54 different items. (We've been open since 1992, and I have a huge folder of media coverage from before 2012, but not online.) I send out regular press releases; every club should have someone sending out periodic press releases to generate media coverage. 

Even though we're an hour away, we get pretty good coverage from the Baltimore Sun, with twelve items, including five in the past two months. But the thing that jumps out to me is that lack of coverage by the Washington Post. The Maryland Table Tennis Center is in Gaithersburg, which is part of the DC Metropolitan Area – we're about 15 miles north of DC. And yet since 2012 we've only had four items in the Post, two in 2012, one in 2014, and one in 2015. What's wrong with them??? Don't they realize table tennis is [we'll get to this part].

On Tuesday night I wrote two press releases, one about the Hope Trials in Canada (MDTTC girls Tiffany Ke and Lisa Lin finished third and fourth), and about the MDTTC Open this past weekend. As usual, the Baltimore Sun did a feature on them. But the Post? Not a word. This is especially aggravating as I've been reading the Post since I was a kid, and I still get daily delivery.

So I wrote a third item, a letter I emailed to Washington Post Sports. Here is the letter. I'll let you know if there's a response.

Dear Washington Post Sports,

I’d like to call your attention to the lack of coverage of the sport of Table Tennis in the Washington Post. I understand the bulk of your coverage will go to sports like football, basketball, and baseball, but consider this:

• Table Tennis is an Olympic Sport.
• Over 17 million Americans play table tennis (Sports and Fitness Industry Reports).
• It’s the third largest participation sport in the world, with 300 million players. (Top End Sports Report.)
• It is considered the best “brain” sport – both for kids and for the elderly. (Google “Table Tennis Brain Sport” and numerous articles and videos will appear.)
• Maryland is a huge mecca for table tennis, with four members of the various National Junior Teams:
  • Derek Nie (USA National Cadet Boys’ Team – under 15)
  • Ryan Dabbs (USA National Mini-cadet Boys’ Team – under 13)
  • Tiffany Ke (USA National Hopes Girls’ Team – under 12)
  • Lisa Lin (USA National Hopes Girls’ Team – under 12)

All four of them train six days a week at the Maryland Table Tennis Center in Gaithersburg, MD, one of the premier centers in the United States. The full-time club has seven full-time coaches who train huge numbers of junior stars, both the four above and many more. Three of the coaches are members of the USA Table Tennis Hall of Fame. The club has won more gold medals for table tennis at the Junior Nationals and Junior Olympics than any other club in the country. The club even has a Talent Program for younger kids (mostly under age 10), which features some of the best kids in the 7-9 age group in the country.

The coaches and kids are now gearing up for upcoming competitions, including the USA Nationals (July 4-9 in Las Vegas) and the Junior Olympics (Aug. 1-3 in Houston).

Just for contrast, the Baltimore Sun has been giving regular coverage to these players, with eleven articles, including four in the past month:

• Tiffany Ke of Gaithersburg Wins Bronze at North American Table Tennis Hopes Trials
• Pair of Maryland natives qualify for national table tennis team
• Unlikely Duo of Table Tennis Players, Derek Nie and Klaus Wood, Train Together
• Table tennis player Lisa Lin wins Girls' Hopes Trials

Would you be interested in doing a story on these National Team Members and the MDTTC junior program?

-Coach Larry Hodges

The Impossible Dream
Yesterday someone (I think Brian Pace) posted a link to Jim Nabors on the old Gomer Pyle TV show (1964-69) singing "To Dream the Impossible Dream." Here's the link (3:52). I think this should be played at the start of all USATT board meetings, at the start of all tournaments, leagues, and practice sessions, and pretty much all the time. (Few people realized that this supposedly bumbling comic actor was actually a top singer.) For a similar "Dream the Impossible Dream" thing, see next segment on Navin Kumar.

Parkinson's Awareness Month - Navin Kumar, USATT Player w/Parkinson's & Mechanical Heart
Here's the video (3:29). (I'm in it several times - I'm his coach.)

Looping Footwork Drill
Here's the video (74 sec) – and the kids have pretty good technique!

The Moment Mima Ito Beat Ding Ning!
Here's the video (34 sec). 15-year-old Mima is world #10; Ding Ning is #2 (but was #1 for 35 months, Nov. 2011 to Aug. 2013 and Oct. 2014 to Oct. 2015

Xu Xin Fingernail trick - Table Tennis Tricks
Here's the video (59 sec). He said it was inspired by the 2012 video A Day with World no 1 Stiga Star Xu Xin (5:48) – he's referring to this trick.

Giant Dumpster Truck Pong?
Here's the video (1:03:18) – "Take a 165-ton dump truck, which is almost as big as a house, the national teams of Austria and Germany, and the world's largest fair for construction…" (It's in German, both spoken and written, but this is what Google translated it to. Players include Timo Boll and Werner Schlager.)

Pony Pong
Here's the picture! Here's a more realistic one.

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USATT Teleconference
Last night we had a USATT board teleconference from 7-9PM. Here's a very rough synopsis of what we went over. Other than approval of minutes of past meetings (items #3 and 4), no votes were taken.

1. Roll Call. Attendees: Board members Peter Scudner (chair), Mike Babuin, Anne Cribbs, Larry Hodges, Kagin Lee, Han Xiao; USATT Foundation Rep John McFadden (subbing for Carl Danner); Dennis Taylor, Legal Counsel and Secretary; Lee Kondo, Assistant Secretary; and CEO Gordon Kaye.
2. Conflict of Interest Statements. There were none. (Other than the meeting conflicting with a coaching session - I got someone to sub.)
3. Approval of the Minutes from December 14, 2015 Board Meeting. They were unanimously approved and will go online soon.
4. Approval of the Minutes from January 4, 2016 Board Teleconference. They were unanimously approved and will go online soon.
5. US National Championships Update. Nothing major here, entry form will be out soon.
6. Financial Update.
7. Membership Update. With the change in our membership system last year, a lot of people who might have joined or rejoined this year instead did so in December, and so on paper, we have a drop in new members joining/rejoining for the first quarter of 2016 – but it's probably just a timing issue. We'll have a better idea of this at the end of the year.
8. Fundraising and Sponsorship Update.
9. High Performance/Olympics and Paralympics Update. Lots of stuff here. I'm involved in the High Performance aspect, primarily with the upcoming USATT two-week training camp coming up after the Nationals in July. I'm looking forward to it!
10. USOC Update.
11. World Veterans Championship Update.
12. Ping Pong Diplomacy Update. Here's some info on that. I didn't take notes on this, but I think they are doing events at Westchester, Lily Yip's club, and I think others.
13. Legal Update. Confidential stuff, can't talk about this! (I can't believe Trump is suing us…is today April 1?)
14. Next In-Person Board Meeting – June 18, 2016 (New Jersey). Looks like I'm going to miss another day of coaching! This board member thing is expensive.
15. Old Business.
16. New Business.
17. Adjourn.

Butterfly MDTTC April Open
April 9, 2016 • Gaithersburg, MD
Complete Results • Rating Results
Wow! I sent the results to USATT electronically at 9PM on Monday, and the ratings were processed by 11AM on Tuesday – a turnaround of 14 hours. Since 11AM is 9AM Colorado Springs time (where USATT headquarters is located), and assuming USATT staff starts work at 8AM, then that's a one-hour turnover. Maybe I'll test this next time by sending them in at 10AM my time. (I'm told that the 4-star Cary Open was also processed in one day.) Remember when it used to take weeks? Here are the main results from the tournament, and links to photos. The tournament was held on ten tables, with 82 players and a total of 259 matches played. And this is the tournament director (me), looking far more energized than he really was.

Open Singles – Final: Chen Bowen d. Wang Qing Liang, 10,10,-6,9,-4,8; SF: Chen d. Stefano Ratti, -12,2,7,-9,10,3; Wang d. Derek Nie, 8,6,4,-8,11; QF: Chen d. Bojun Zhangliang, 4,3,6; Ratti d. Raghu Nadmichettu, 12,8,13; Nie d. Lixin Lang, 8,9,8; Wang d. Klaus Wood, 9,6,8.
Under 2350 – Final: Stefano Ratti d. Frederick Nicolas, 2,10,6; SF: Ratti d. Darwin Ma, 6,4,7; Nicolas d. Vikash Sahu, 11,9,-11,-4,7.
Under 2000 – Final: George Nie d. William Waltrip, -2,8,-8,7,11; SF: Nie d. Spencer Ip, 9,-8,5,-4,10; Waltrip d. Mohamed Kamara, 6,9,8.
Under 1700 – Final: Vincent Adebavo d. Walid Alkadi, 9,9,9; SF: Adebavo d. Darryl Boyer, 9,-8,5,8; Alkadi d. Alvin Whitney, -8,7,7,-10,8.
Under 1350 – Final: Ranian Bhambroo d. Stanley Hsu, 9,5,9; SF: Bhambroo d. Adrian Yang, -11,12,9,-14,7; Hsu d. Wessam Alkadi, 9,-5,5,8.
Over 50 – Final RR: 1st Lixin Lang, 3-0; 2nd Frederick Nicolas, 2-1; 3rd Chris Buckley, 1-2; 4th James Wilson, 0-3.
Under 15 – Final: George Li d. Jessica Lin, 11,-5,2,6; SF: Li d. Walid Alkadi, 8,-10,11,8; Lin d. Abbas Paryavi, 6,9,9; QF: Li d. Hassam Alkadi, 8,6,8; W. Alkadi d. Ali Paryavi, 6,-11,4,7; Abbas Paryavi d. Sameer Shaikh, 5,7,-7,-9,6; Lin d. Adrian Yang, 9,12,5.

Tiffany Ke of Gaithersburg Wins Bronze at North American Table Tennis Hopes Trials
Here's the article in this morning's Baltimore Sun, which features Hopes Trials Bronze medalist Tiffany Ke, fourth-place finisher Lisa Lin, as well as results from the MDTTC Open held this past weekend, featuring the Open, Over 50, and Under 15 events. (Here are complete results.)

Luck or Skill?
Here's the new coaching article from Samson Dubina, where he relates how he panicked and lost a match, and gives three tips on how to avoid this.

Pro Tips: Serving Direction
Here's the new coaching article from Carl Danner.

Ask the Coach Show
Episode #254 (24:04) - Improving Your Serve (and other segments).

National Collegiate Table Tennis Association "Best of the Best"
Here's the article.

Club Truly an International Organization
Here's the article on the Columbus Table Tennis Club in Ohio.

Interview with Jeremy Hazin, Butterfly Cary Cup Championship Quarterfinalist
Here's the video (2:05) where the Canadian junior star is interviewed by Barbara Wei.

Table Tennis in Slow Motion 2015
Here's the video (11:55).

DHS Top 10 Shots at the 2016 Qatar Open
Here's the video (5:20). (This is a different one than the one posted two weeks ago.)

2016 ITTF-Asia Olympic Qualification Tournament - Day 1 Evening
Here's the video (live right now!).

Minnesota Open
Here's the highlights video (3:17).

Red Dwarf Table Tennis
Here's the description of the character Denton in the British comedy/science fiction series Red Dwarf: "Whilst playing ping-pong with a fellow crewmember in the Games Room, Denton was frozen in time, along with most of the rest of the crew on the ship, by Kryten using the Time Wand. Lister and Rimmer, broken free from The Hole by Bob the Skutter, passed the ping-pong playing duo and took their ball, to mess with them when they unfroze." It includes a picture of "Denton (holding the bat) frozen in time whilst playing table tennis."

Ping the Table Tennis Robot
Here's the picture!

***
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Energized vs. Non-Energized, Back Problems, and Todo List
There are really two types of energy in table tennis – physical and mental. The mental often overpowers the physical. I sometimes think I'm tired (physically) roughly 90% of the time, but you simply have to overcome that mentally. But a lot of it depends on who you are coaching or hitting with, or what you are working on.

When coaching or playing an energized player who is trying hard, you get energized. When paired with an uninterested player, you lose energy. When working with a kid who has no interest and is constantly asking "How much longer?", or who simply goofs off constantly, you have absolutely no energy, and feel like a black hole of lethargy. (All coaches have faced that.)

When working on something that I'm really interested in – in particular coaching or writing projects – I tend to be more energized. When working on projects like setting up the Maryland State Championships – well, it's exciting to have one, but the actual work in setting it up is a bit non-energizing. Sometimes when I find myself working on something that's "important," but will take up a lot of hours that few if anyone will ever know happened, it's a bit non-energizing. (That describes most USATT work!) Maybe that's why I sometimes put my todo list in my blog (see below)? There's also the problem of helping out thankless people, where you spend a lot of time helping someone out, and they just take it for granted. (I could go into a rant on that, but won't.)

Because of my recent back problems – the first time I think in a year and a half – coaching has been especially hard this past week, as was running the MDTTC tournament this past Saturday. It's hard to be energized when you feel like there's a knife in your back, slowly jiggling about. Sometimes the back problems fade away into the background as I'm absorbed with some coaching aspect or getting a draw done. Other times it sort of knocks on the door continuously, saying, "I'm still here!" But it's about 80% better now. Yesterday and today I'm feeling a bit more energized – and so I'm getting a lot done! (I saw a therapist about this several years ago. My back problems are of a different type than most, and come about because my right side is so much stronger than my left side, from 40 years of table tennis, and so my spine is literally pulled sideways by the stronger muscles on the right. The cure is regular stretching of a specific muscle in the back, which I'm doing regularly now after neglecting it in recent times.)

Assuming I can keep the energy up, here is my current todo list – with about 15 other items checked off yesterday.

• USATT Teleconference tonight at 7PM;
• Two upcoming exhibitions/demonstrations;
• Helping a top U.S. superstar player and coach with his upcoming book (both coaching and autobiographical) – sorry, can't say who yet!
• Write and send out press releases on Tiffany Ke and Lisa Lin getting bronze and fourth at the North American Hopes Trials;
• Plan and organize Maryland Closed;
• Arrange a new ITTF coaching course at MDTTC that I'll likely be teaching this fall;
• Finding a way to have copies of Insider printed and mailed to elderly members of USATT Hall of Fame (and possibly others) – difficulty is we currently do not have a Senior Committee;
• Continue USATT work on getting more state championships and leagues;
• Work out afterschool program finances;
• Blogging and Tips of the Week;
• Coach 15-20 hours/week (private and group sessions);
• Plan, practice, and produce a trick shot video for the next ITTF trick shot contest - I have some interesting ideas for this;
• Some quiet, behind-the-scenes work and discussions on fixing up the problem with hidden serves – things are getting worse as players have discovered they can pretty much get away with anything, even hiding the ball blatantly with their free arm – more on that later this week, along with video and still images of these illegal serves that decide most major events, including the Olympic Team;
• Go back to work on the long postponed book, "Parents Guide to Table Tennis"?
• Non-table tennis - Read and critique 18 short stories for my annual summer "vacation" at a writing workshop in Manchester, NH (where we critique each other's work and run seminars), plus finalize one more story of my own – about a microscopic and egotistical nanobot that travels the galaxy in a huge ship, conquering and enslaving civilizations and forcing them to worship and build monuments to him – and his adventures when he invades earth. Sorry, no table tennis! (But when I Google "Nanobots table tennis pictures," I get this animated gif of two nanobots playing!)

State Championships This Weekend
There are three big state championships this weekend - if you are a resident of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, or Wisconsin, sign up below! (Or perhaps show up and spectate!)

• New Jersey State Championships
• Pennsylvania State Championships
• Wisconsin State Championships

How to Become a More Powerful Table Tennis Player
Here's the new coaching article from MH Table Tennis.

Ask the Coach Show
Episode #253 (23 min) - North American Olympic Qualification (and other segments).

11 Questions with Zhou Xin
Here's the USATT interview with the ICC coach and 2722 rated player.

Interview with Neha Aggarwal
Here's the USATT interview by Rahul Acharya. "Born and raised in New Delhi, India, 26 year old Neha Aggarwal has lived the life that most athletes can only dream of - to represent their country at the Olympics. Even though she is now retired as a professional player, table tennis remains very close to Neha's heart, and she hopes to increase its popularity worldwide. Neha's career not only took her all over India, but also to more than 40 countries. She hopes to use these experiences to make a splash in the sports business industry. To fully equip herself with the needed skills, Neha moved to the U.S. last fall to pursue a Master's degree in Sports Management at Columbia University."

Butterfly Presents: Getting To Know Jack Wang
Here's the video (3:12).

History of U.S. Table Tennis, Vol. 17, Chapter 4
Here it is! You can buy this or other volumes at TimBogganTableTennis.com.

The Chicago Table Tennis League Has Come Down to its Final Matches
Here's the article.

2016 World Table Tennis Day for All
Here's the article by Angela Guan (member of USA National Junior Girls' Team).

Amazing backhand around the net in the Russian League
Here's the video (46 sec, including slo-mo replay) of what was a great point even before this shot takes place!

Iron Pony Table Tennis Video Game
Here it is! Why do anything else when you can play Pony Pong?

Cactus Pong
Here's the picture!

Non-Table Tennis: Interview: Feodora Zubkov from Campaign 2100: Game of Scorpions by Larry Hodges
Here's the "interview" at Literary Escapism with one of the characters from my novel! "Feodora, the diminutive general who led Russian troops to an upset victory over Japanese invaders in 2091, was recruited to run for vice president of Earth in the election of 2100, as chronicled in the historical novel Campaign 2100: Game of Scorpions." Here's how the interview begins:

INTERVIEWER: General, why do you want to be vice president of Earth?

FEODORA: This small general not interested in vice president, I just along for ride, maybe live in vice president palace—has nice hot tub. But start wars, party with pirates, these I do to help Toby be president. He’s dahling.

INTERVIEWER: You party with pirates? And you’d start a war just to win the election?

FEODORA: Politics is war. But it’s good war for good cause, and I start it secretly, nobody knows—except you. So now small general must have you eliminated.

***
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Tip of the Week
How to Do Demonstrations.

MDTTC April Open
I ran the tournament this past weekend at the Maryland Table Tennis Center. Here are complete results. Now, can I go back to bed?!!! (I'll put up photos later on.)

I've run about 150 USATT sanctioned tournaments, dating back to the early 1980s. However, except for two that I ran back in 2012, I hadn't run any in about a decade. But as noted in past blogs, Charlene Liu, who had been running our tournaments, is now running her own full-time club in Washington DC, and so we needed a new director. So who did they ask/recruit/enslave? (But I do get paid.)

So I had to relearn the process all over again. I used Omnipong for the tournament, just as I did in 2012, and it worked great. Wen Hsu and Lixin Lang helped out tremendously, and were the difference for me between exhaustion, and complete, utter, annihilating exhaustion.

We normally have 16 tables up at MDTTC (occasionally 18 for training), but for tournaments we normally go to eight full-sized courts, with five smaller courts for the coaches. The first event of the tournament was Under 2000 at 9AM, which had a limit of 32 players. But I wasn't checking the daily entries until too late, and on Friday I discovered we had 41 entries. I didn't want to turn players away after we'd already received their entry. Doing some intense arithmetic, I realized that would mean eight groups of five, with one player seeded out. The problem is that a group of five players means ten matches, which will normally take over three hours on one table. (Figure 20 minutes per match. For a group of four, that's six matches, and so two hours.) With Under 1700 starting at 11AM, with seven groups of four (I successfully limited that at 28, just in time), that would put us at least an hour behind.

So I worked out how we could fit in nine full-sized courts, and run it with nine groups of four, with five seeded out of the preliminaries. But while I was doing this, Wen worked out a way of fitting ten full-sized courts (still leaving four small courts for the coaches), and presto, problem solved! So I seeded only one player out, and ran ten groups of four. And guess what? It all ran right on time! (Isn't math wonderful?)

There were stretches where things at the control desk were slow. But that was rare. Much of the time I was being pulled in 17 directions as I entered players in events, did draws, printed, put on clipboards, called for players (with Lixin's help), sent them out, answered questions, and all the other stuff needed. When I discovered I'd inadvertently left a player out of Under 15 (my only mistake of the tournament – I think, though there's still a mystery of two players who said they entered but we didn't receive them, though I got them into the draws at the last minute), it happened at the worst possible time, when I was simultaneously running five events, with tables emptying out and me trying to send out playoff matches. I think my hands worked at 100,000 mph for about 15 minutes as I redid that draw and got the matches went out along with the other playoffs, all while answering non-stop questions and bantering with the large accumulation of kids from our junior program who liked to gather around the control desk. (Perhaps my bringing in a bowl of candy was a mistake?)

One interesting note – we "unleashed" a number of the 7-9 year-olds from the MDTTC Talent program. Most had played in the North American Teams in November, but they've vastly improved since then. There were some eye-popping matches where these kids battled it out with players up to nine times their age and five times their weight! When Ranjan Bhambroo won Under 1350 over 7-year-old Stanley Hsu, I told him to hold on to the picture we took of the finalists – which I'll post tomorrow – as someday he's going to want to show everyone how he once beat Stanley.

When all was done, things worked out pretty well, and all's well that ends well. We kept the tournament on time, and I think the players went home happy (other than perhaps their own personal results). Our next tournament is June 11 – see you then!

Oh, and now the down side – spending twelve hours at a desk running a tournament is not the best cure for a bad back. I did three hours of coaching yesterday, and it's not too bad, so I can do my 2.5 hours of coaching tonight. But it needs a rest, and we have a USATT teleconference tomorrow at 7PM (which overlaps my last half hour of the 2.5 hours of coaching I have scheduled Tuesday), so I'm taking tomorrow off, with Raghu subbing for me. I think I should be back to regular coaching after that, assuming my back cooperates. (I had gone about 1.5 years without back problems, so I'm hoping to repeat that.)  

North American Olympic Trials
They were held this past weekend in Toronto. Here is the USA home page for the event, with complete results, articles, pictures, and video. Congratulations to the 2016 Olympians!

• Men's Singles: Feng Yijun, Kanak Jha
• Men's Teams: Feng Yijun, Kanak Jha, Timothy Wang
• Women's Singles: Yue "Jennifer" Wu, Lily Zhang
• Women's Teams: Yue "Jennifer" Wu, Lily Zhang, Jiaqi Zheng
• Canadians: Eugene Wang in Men's Singles, Mo Zhang in Women's Singles

Kanak Jha Becomes Youngest Ever Male Table Tennis Olympian
Here's the ITTF story on the new USA Olympian. Interesting note – in the semifinals, Kanak was down 5-0 in the seventh to Canada's Pierre-Luc Theriault, but won eleven points in a row!

North American Hopes Trials
They were also held this past weekend in Toronto, for under 12 players. Here is the home page for the event, with complete results and other info. On the girl's side, my club, MDTTC had two of the four USA entries (among the eight qualifiers, the other four from Canada), Tiffany Ke and Lisa Lin, who finished third and fourth. (In the complete RR stage, where everyone played everyone else, Tiffany finished second with a 6-1 record, defeating Joanna Sung 3-0 – but the next day, in the knockout state, she lost to Joanna in the semifinals, 0-3.) The final was between the Sung sisters, Joanna and Rachel, with Rachel winning. All four semifinalists were USA, with the four Canadians all losing in the quarterfinals. On the boys' side, it was another all-USA final, with Len Yang coming back from down 0-2 to win against Mudit Mahajan. Rachel Sung and Len Yang both qualified to go to the ITTF Hopes Week in Doha, Qatar, May 29-June 4.

Table Tennis - An Open Letter to the ITTF
Here's the new animated show (5:01) from Sports Interrogation – with some great questions that match some of the very same questions I've blogged about repeatedly about the serving rules and enforcement, and boosting. (Also about audiences and other issues.) You know, those pesky rules that aren't followed while the people in charge look the other way. I watched some of the North American Olympic Trials, and it was depressing watching all the cheating that was allowed (i.e. illegal hidden serves), right out there in public, even when players complained to the umpires. I'll be blogging about that later this week, with pictures and links to video. But who can you trust, your eyes or those who pretend it isn't happening? (Actually, the ones who can fix the problem are mostly split between those who deny it's happening,  those who believe someone else should fix it, and those who simply want the problem to go away on its own, which isn't happening. Leaders are supposed to try to fix problems, not deny, punt, or ignore. I tried to get the USATT board to take action on this in December, to no avail - minutes on that will be up soon - so now it's up to ITTF.) 

Learn to Fully Develop Your Game - Before and After
Here's the new coaching article from Samson Dubina.

Taking a Hard Look at Table Tennis
Here's the new article from Coach Jon.

Ask the Coach Show
They tricked us! Episode #250 was titled "Our Last Show." And now they're back with two more episodes, with #251 creatively named titled, "We're Back." Welcome back!

• Episode #251 (22:29) - We're Back (and other segments)
• Episode #252 (24:50) - Doubles Serving Tactics (and other segments)

Lindenwood University Brothers Love Table Tennis
Here's the article.

Drabble Pong
Here's the table tennis cartoon featuring your friendly neighborhood giant multi-legged bug. (Marv Anderson alerted me to this one.)

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