May 17, 2016

Adjusting to Different Balls in the Yucky Insane Plastic Era (YIPE!)
One of the realities of the YIPE era (yes, that's what I'm calling it!), where we use plastic balls instead of celluloid (which is actually a type of plastic, but we won't get into that), is that the balls vary widely, far more than before. It used to be that everyone knew that Butterfly balls were slightly softer and lighter than Nittakus, and you'd warm up with the appropriate tournament ball and you'd be ready. But now they vary dramatically. Playing with the various 40+ Nittaku, DHS, Butterfly, JOOLA, and the seamless Xu Shao Fa is like trying to play basketball where one moment you're dribbling a basketball, then suddenly (in no particular order) it's a bowling ball, then a baseball, then a golf ball, etc.

One of my students, Daniel (who I've blogged about before) played in the Capital Area League this past Saturday. He tends to play too passive, and so we've spent a lot of time working on using his serve to set up his attack. Alas, we weren't using a Nittaku Premium 40+, and so when he used that in the league, he said it felt really heavy, and he had no confidence in his attack. Result? He went back to pushing.

The moral here, and for others, is that you need to work out in advance what events you'll be playing in, find out what balls they will be using, get a supply of each type, and make sure to practice with that ball before each event.

They really, Really, REALLY need to standardize ping-pong balls. We are in an insane era of table tennis, where tournaments are like a box of chocolates – you never know what type of ball you're going to use next - unless you check in advance. Add the insanity of umpires not enforcing the hidden serve rule and making undetectable boosting illegal - so that only those willing to cheat get the advantage of these, and so completely dominate higher-level table tennis - and we really do live in an insane table tennis era. Maybe we should call it the Insane Plastic Cheating Era. But I like YIPE. 

Online Entries for the USA Nationals
Here's the page where you can enter online. As of this morning, they have 23 entries. I expect they'll finish with 700 or more.

New York State Championships
Here are results and pictures. The event was held this past weekend at the Westchester TTC. Men's and Women's Champions are Kai Zhang and Yuko Tsuji. Over 40 and Over 60 Champions were Philippe Dassonval and Robert Spitzer. Under 18, 14, and 10 Champions were Kai Zhang, Rohan Acharya, and Matthew Ioffe. Congrats to all, and thanks to the Westchester tournament staff!

A Positive Spin on the USATT League Program
Here's the article from Coach Jon. (Robert Mayer and I created this a number of years ago; he now maintains it.)

Do Lefties Have an Advantage in Table Tennis?
Here's the poll and discussion.

Multiball Training
Here's the video (2:35) of a high-level junior doing a series of multiball drills. The first one is a good four-ball drill – forehand from forehand side, backhand from backhand side, then two forehands, one from middle, one from backhand.

11 Questions with Ari Arratia
Here's the USATT Interview with the U.S. Paralympic star.

Interview with Rawle Alleyne
Here's the USATT interview by Rahul Acharya

History of U.S. Table Tennis, Volume 17 (1989-1990)
Here's chapter 9! Or order your own print copies at TimBogganTableTennis.com.

RIO 2016
Here's an article on the upcoming Olympics and table tennis, from a Canadian perspective.

Five-Ball Pong
Here's the video (15 sec)!

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