Develop an Overpowering Strength and Ways to Use It
This article, now online at Butterflyonline.com, was originally a Tip of the Week from back in February, but I added some stuff from Coach Jack Huang (one of my co-coaches at MDTTC), and sent it in to Butterfly, who published it yesterday. (You even get to see a picture of me and my "devastating" forehand!) A related article is How to Move Up a Level, which explains the five things you need to do to improve a level, with #5 about finding that overpowering strength and ways to use it.
Back update - I'm back!
Yesterday I got the okay from my physical therapist to resume table tennis activities as long as I go easy on it. I can finally hit with my students! For the last couple weeks I've had others come in to do my hitting.
Originally I was going to take six weeks off, but the therapist thought three weeks would be enough, and now, after two weeks, after examining my back, said I'm ready. It's been a busy two weeks; I've been doing a ten-minute stretching and strengthening routine three times a day, and meeting with the therapist twice a week for a more rigorous routine.
For now, I'll just do easy stuff - multiball, blocking and easy countering, and perhaps I'll do a few easy loops just to test it out. Surprisingly, the back rotation from my forehand pendulum serve (along with looping) put the most strain on my back; I'll test that out. Playing games also put a lot of strain as I wouldn't know where the next ball was going and often did last-second moves that strained the back - and this was even more true even when playing beginners, since they spray the ball randomly all over.
So you want to be a better table tennis coach?