Tip of the Week
Coaching Tournament Matches.

How The Swedes Will Beat the Chinese Again
Ake Waldner visited MDTTC this past Saturday, spending the day watching our
players train. He is the brother of former Swedish superstar Jan-Ove Waldner, and was
recently named Head Coach of the Swedish National Men’s Team. Our players had some
interesting questions, of course. Sweden had battled with China for decades, with such
legendary players as Bengtsson, Persson, Appelgren, and of course Waldner.

First question, of course, was rather straightforward – how could Sweden, USA,
or any other team possibly beat China? I’ve always argued that if we use the same
orthodox techniques that make the Chinese so good, we’ll always be just a pale
likeness, with no chance of matching them.

Ake agreed with me! And it turns out the Swedes are working on new techniques,
practicing things that might allow them to beat the Chinese. Serve, receive, and
rallies – you have to win at all...

USA Nationals Entry Form
While browsing around this morning I discovered that the entry form for the 2017 Supermicro USA Nationals was up. (Here’s a direct link to the print entry form.) This is the first I’d seen it – I printed it out and will go over it more closely later today. The tournament will be in Las Vegas, July 3-8 (Mon-Sat). (The hotel link still links to the U.S. Open hotel from December.)

There are a mind-boggling 97 events. Most are similar to last year’s Nationals. I did find some interesting items – for example, what appears to be Men’s and Women’s Singles are currently named simply “Hsing Family Foundation.” Presumably that’s a sponsor, but it probably should be “Hsing Family Foundation Men’s/Women’s Singles.” Beyond that are the usual events – Men’s & Women’s Doubles and Mixed Doubles; Junior, Cadet, and Mini-Cadet Team Trials (...

Stomach Queasiness and the Tip of the Week
For the second day in a row I woke up to what feels like the World Table Tennis Championships going on in my stomach. I’m guessing it’s some sort of stomach virus, or some sort of cold or flu, or perhaps I swallowed a gross of ping-pong balls or something. Symptoms are extreme stomach queasiness and discomfort; runny nose; extreme exhaustion; and an extreme compulsion to lie down for a few years. I started writing the Tip of the Week (Serve and Forehand Loop), but I think I’ll finish that tomorrow. I did manage to get through 3.5 hours of coaching yesterday, despite exhaustion, helped out by one player having to cancel (I had 4.5 hours scheduled). Tonight I only have two. (My current schedule: Sun 8.5 hours; Mon 4.5 hours; Tue 2 hours; Wed 2 hours; Thu & Fri off - writing days; Sat 5-7 hours.) 

Some of this might have been brought on by recent very bad sleep habits. I generally go to bed sometime between midnight and 1AM, and up at 7AM, but recently I’ve been up until 3AM, and still getting up at 7AM as that’s when I keep waking up – probably because the...

USA National Team Trials
They had the preliminary qualifier yesterday, with the main Trials today through Sunday. Tournament is at the Triangle TTC in North Carolina. Below are links. Livestreaming  starts at noon today, Eastern time. I wish I were there!

• Home page (draws, results, and livestreaming)
• Seedings Prevail as Qualifications Complete Trials Draw (qualifier article by Matt Hetherington)
• Players Practicing (3 min, set to music). Can you name the players?

USATT Team Funding Week
USATT has a funding page, Friends with Paddles, where you can “directly fund USATT’s...