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This is an evolving website and Table Tennis Community. Your suggestions are welcome.

Want a daily injection of Table Tennis? Come read the Larry Hodges Blog! (Entries go up by noon, Mon-Fri; see link on left.) Feel free to comment!

Want to talk Table Tennis? Come join us on the forum. While the focus here is on coaching, the forum is open to any table tennis talk.

Want to Learn? Read the Tip of the Week, study videos, read articles, or find just about any other table tennis coaching site from the menu links. If you know of one, please let us know so we can add it.

Want to Learn more directly? There are two options. See the Video Coaching link for info on having your game analyzed via video. See the Clinics link for info on arranging a clinic in your area, or finding ones that are already scheduled.

If you have any questions, feel free to email, post a note on the forum, or comment on my blog entries.

-Larry Hodges, Director, TableTennisCoaching.com

Member, USA Table Tennis Hall of Fame & USATT Certified National Coach
Professional Coach at the Maryland Table Tennis Center

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Recent TableTennisCoaching.com blog posts

Thursday, September 7, 2017 - 14:10
September 7, 2017

New ITTF World Rankings
Here’s the new listing. On the men’s side, the top five spots remained unchanged. Mizutani (JPN) dropped two spots to #8, with Boll (GER) and Chun Ting Wong (HKG) each moving up one spot to #6 and #7. But the more interesting change came from two other Japanese players. Matsudaira moved from #16 to #12, while the whiz kid, 14-year-old Harimoto, shot from #20 to #13.

So which countries challenge China’s supremacy on the men’s side? Here are countries with at least three players in the top 50.

  • China: #1, 2, 3, 4, 11, 29, 35 spots. (They likely have a number of others who would be in the top 50, probably top 20.)
  • Germany: #4, 6, 23, 29, 43
  • Japan: #8, 9, 12, 13, 18, 19, 25, 28, 32
  • South Korea: #14, 21, 42, 49, 50
  • France: #16, 20, 44
  • Portugal: #17, 39, 48
  • Sweden: #22, 24, 39

China is obviously a huge favorite in any team match-up. But when they play Germany or Japan, it can be interesting as those countries have small, but legitimate chances. Perhaps Korea as...

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Wednesday, September 6, 2017 - 13:50
September 6, 2017

Tip of the Week
Weapons to Allow Opponents to Beat Themselves.

Fall Coaching and USATT Stuff
My fall schedule keeps changing and getting busier. But the good news is I’ve managed to keep Mon, Tue, and Fri open for rest, writing, and various USATT and MDTTC activities. The bad news it means longer hours on other days. Here’s my updated coaching schedule:

  • Wed: 5:30-8:45 (one 15 min break)
  • Thur: 5:30-9:30
  • Sat: 11AM-4:00PM (will likely have a 4-5PM student, and twice a month also have 6:30-8:30PM)
  • Sun: 2:45-8:30PM (one 15-min break, and I will likely have more Sunday hours before 2:45PM)

Meanwhile, now that the summer is over, I’m about to launch into a number of coaching committee activities. (I’m chair.) I’d hoped to get into these issues this week, but they may have to wait until next week as I have a number of other issues still to deal with from my todo list, but I won’t get into that now. (They are a mixture of table tennis and my outside science fiction writing...

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Tuesday, September 5, 2017 - 12:32
September 5, 2017

After trying to take Labor Day off, I found myself wanting to catch up on work that I’d planned to do today – and ended up working half the night. When I tried going to sleep, I was too wound up. When it reached 4:30 AM and I was still up, I realized I was going to have a problem. I finally got to sleep, then woke up at 7:30 AM. My head is pounding like I’d gone twelve rounds with The Hulk, my eyelids weigh more than The Hulk, and my eyes feel like Ma Long and The Hulk plucked them out and played a best of seven with each. Sorry, no blog today, but at least I’m (mostly) caught up on various table tennis and writing matters. I’ll be back tomorrow with the blog and Tip of the Week. I need to put on my wall, “Early to bed, early to rise, is what morning bloggers must prioritize.”  Oh, and speaking of The Hulk:

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Monday, September 4, 2017 - 12:25
September 4, 2017

It's Labor Day, so no laboring on my blog today. I'm spending the day in my lounge chair reading "Brave New World," which somehow I'd never gotten around to reading, and perhaps watching "Giant," which is on TCM at 4:30PM. See you all tomorrow. Oh, and here's a video of cats and table tennis (2:19). 

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Friday, September 1, 2017 - 13:11
September 1, 2017

USATT Club Coach Certification Course
Much of the current USATT coaching certification process was set up when we had few coaches in this country, and were desperately trying to get coaches certified. (I was coaching chair for four years in the 1990s, and remember those problems.) Currently you can become a club coach just by passing a test, having two years USATT membership, and a 1400 rating, current or past.

I don’t think you should have specific rating requirements for specific coaching levels – they are separate things, though closely related. A better rule would be to require (along with other criteria) a specific minimum rating achieved, or similar relevant experience. So that’s going to change.

We’re looking to change the certification process, now that we have so many more coaches than before. Below is a very rough outline of a six-hour coaching seminar for becoming club coach. Later I will expand on it, giving more details on what should be taught in each segment and how. It should be somewhat easy for any high-level coach to run such a seminar at any club in the country, where they’d just...

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Thursday, August 31, 2017 - 13:59
August 31, 2017

$2700 Butterfly MDTTC August Open
Aug. 26-27, 2017 • Gaithersburg, Maryland
By Larry Hodges (tournament director)
[NOTE – not interested in reading about a local tournament, with a final between two of the best players in the country? Then jump ahead to the other segments below!]

The MDTTC August Open was the day the choppers, juniors, and women & girls roared. There were choppers in the final and quarterfinals of the Open, and they won Under 2200 and Under 1500. There were juniors in the final of five of the six rating events (and – surprise! – both junior events). And women & girls won three of the six rating events. The ultimate winner was Stephanie Zhang, a chopping junior girl who won Under 1500!

Top-seeded Jishan Liang (2671) of New York, a powerful lefty two-winged looper, won the Open over second-seeded chopper/looper Jian Li (2660) of New Jersey, 2-1 win in this best of seven. Well, it was scheduled to be best of seven, but both players asked if they could play best of five, and we...

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Wednesday, August 30, 2017 - 13:03
August 30, 2017

Capital Area Team League and Other Leagues
The Capital Area Team League is for players in the Maryland, Virginia, and DC area. The “early bird” special deadline is tomorrow, August 31. Final deadline to enter is Sept. 12. If you don’t have a team, the league committee can help you find one. First league matches are on Oct. 1. Here are the basic rules:

  • Teams have a roster of at least 3 players.
  • Team contests will have 6 individual matches and one doubles.
  • Each team will be placed in a division according to their ratings, with similarly-rated teams – priority consideration will be given to teams who have participated in the last season.
  • No USATT membership required to play.
  • Detail league rules here.

So . . . you want to play in such a league, but don’t live in the Capital area? Here’s the USATT League page, where you can find info on other...

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Tuesday, August 29, 2017 - 12:19
August 29, 2017

Fall Scheduling
With local schools starting next week, I’m working out my new Fall coaching schedule. This is one of those surprisingly tricky things, sort of like trying to do a 20-piece jigsaw puzzle, which sounds easy except the pieces keep moving around, changing shape, and sometimes disappearing, with new ones showing up randomly.

During the summer we have little private coaching before 6PM (Mon-Fri) due to our summer camps. (Only available times are before 10AM and during the 1-3PM lunch break, but I rarely schedule during those times.) So while we often have sessions after school at 4 or 5PM, during the summer everyone has to move to after 6PM. But now, with school nights, the kids generally do their sessions earlier. But strangely, most of them have other afterschool activities (!), so we have to schedule around them. Worse, their schedules aren’t set in stone – they keep changing as they get new info, and sometimes it changes, week to week. Plus I have to work the schedules around my group sessions, which are mostly on Thursdays and weekends.

My weekend schedule won’t change much, just my Mon-Fri...

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Monday, August 28, 2017 - 14:12
August 28, 2017

Tip of the Week
Covering the Wide Angles.

$2700 Butterfly MDTTC August Open, PongMobile, and that Nasty Todo List
Getting up to blog after a pair of 15-hour days is like facing Mayweather for 12 rounds, then fighting The Mountain from Game of Thrones, and then jogging a marathon or two. This past weekend I ran the tournament, with great help from Mossa Barandao of PongMobile. I plan to do a write-up later today, with pictures, which I’ll send off for publication at the news sites at USATT and Butterfly, and link to from my blog afterwards. You can get complete results at Omnipong. Congrats to champions Jishan Liang, Khaleel Asgarali, Ed Watts, Kallista Liu, Haoran Guan, Stephanie Zhang, Todd Klinger, Xinsheng Michael Huang, George Li, and Stanley Hsu!

What’s PongMobile? Mossa sets up a station at our tournaments and leagues so players can easily...

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Friday, August 25, 2017 - 13:55
August 25, 2017

USATT Coaching Questions
I’ve been very busy this summer - coaching, traveling, and writing. One casualty of this is that I haven’t done as much as chair of the USATT coaching committee as I’d have liked. However, sometime in the next few weeks I should be able to focus more on that. Here are upcoming coaching items. (Here’s the list of USATT committees – we’re third on the list.) I also have a coaching committee report due to the board, which I should have by Sept. 1. (We have a USATT board meeting in Washington DC, Sept. 9-10.)

What is the primary responsibility of the coaching committee? I’d say to recruit, train, and certify coaches. Recruitment basically means encouraging potential coaches into taking the plunge, either as part-time or full-time coaches. For the latter, this essentially means showing them that they can make a good living as a table tennis coach – as over 300 currently do in the United States.

Training means educating coaches so they become better coaches. I’ve had numerous...

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