June 15, 2016

History of U.S. Table Tennis, Volume 18 – Status, Plus Other Stuff
We've been at it all day starting Thursday morning, excluding Saturday (when I ran the MDTTC June Open), so it's been five long days so far. We've done the covers, the four intro pages, and 11 chapters, totaling 169 pages with 421 graphics. There will be 26 chapters, so 15 more to go. Figuring that the covers and intro pages are about as much work as a chapter, we're 12/27 of the way through. (Alas, some of the latter chapters appear to be rather long.)

We're hampered by the fact that I'm putting in a good eight hours every day in addition to working with Tim from 7AM to 2:30PM each day. Mon-Fri I leave at 2:30 for the afterschool program, then private and group coaching, and then I return after 8PM or so to a huge backlog of work to do – last night I started work about 8:30PM and didn't finish until 2:30 AM – and went to bed right as Tim was getting up! (As I've mentioned, he keeps strange hours.) So we had a "late" start this morning, starting at 8AM instead of the usual 7AM. Tim was good about it, only smacked me across the face a few dozen times.

There's also the problem that on Friday afternoon I have to leave to drive to the USATT board meeting in New Jersey, and won't return until late Saturday night. Even worse, the MDTTC summer camps start on Monday – and though I might try to get out of them that week, I might be needed in the morning sessions (10AM-1PM). The good news? Four of my regular private students are all out of town (or about to do so), meaning I'll have more time with Timmy.  

Good news – last night was the first full night of sleep I've had since last Thursday morning – I got to bed at 11:30PM, was up at 6:30AM. There will be few of those in my future over the next couple weeks.

I mentioned "Other Stuff" in the headline above – and there's been a few:

  • 11-year-old Daniel, who won Under 1700 at the MDTTC June Open, has developed this backhand serve from the very wide forehand corner that's getting to be deadly. Because of where he stands, he can curve the ball very short to the forehand so it's very hard to reach. He does pop it up slightly sometimes, and I flip kill those, but when he keeps it low – as he does more and more – it's very hard to do much with. You'd think his standing way over there would put him out of position, but the awkward position he puts opponents in when they have to reach so far over the table as the ball spins away from them, almost parallel to and only inches away from the net, puts them in an even worse position – and Daniel is quick at recovering. He usually follows with an aggressive shot to the wide backhand before opponents (or me, when we play points during our sessions) can recover.
  • We had to stay late on Saturday night after the tournament. Why? Because a player was driving up 2.5 hours to buy a racket from us, and said he'd arrive around 10:20PM. I don't know which racket he bought (I don't handle sales), but let's just say I was a bit surprised someone would drive that far just to buy one of our rackets.
  • Yesterday, about ten minutes before I was set to coach on the back table (by the robot), an Islamic player had set out pads on the floor in the court and was bowing toward Mecca (as required five times per day). I wasn't sure what to do, so I slowly backed away and went up front until he was done. At least now I know the direction to Mecca, if I ever need it.
  • Anyone who thinks kids don't know what's going on in the world do not know kids – or at least modern connected kids. Even the 7- and 8-year-olds know all about the shootings in Florida, and most even know what type of gun was used. (They also know much of the stuff Trump says – but universally seem to despise him.)
  • I'm aware of the problems with the USATT ratings and USATT singles league, and have been in contact with the USATT front office on this. (If you are not aware of the problems, then let's keep it that way, okay?) They are working on it. I'll get a much better idea of what's causing all the problems at the USATT board meeting this Saturday. (It's at the Lily Yip TTC in New Jersey – USATT members are welcome to listen in except during occasional closed sessions, which are generally short.)

Stance
Here's the new coaching article (with links to video) by Samson Dubina. This is an excellent article, which also illustrates the difference in stance between normal players and world-class players. Bear in mind that the world-class players who use the same stance for forehand and backhand are training full-time, including physical training – and so have very fast transitions. Most "normal" players might have difficulty with this, but if you are highly athletic (and perhaps have a rather supple waist), then perhaps try it. 

Jiaqi Zheng Does Physical Training to Prepare for Olympics
Here's the video (29 sec).

Franklin Mejias Spotlight Interview
Here's the video (4:17). "Nothing's impossible, I can do everything - Franklin Mejias. A remarkable 16 year old quadruple amputee who has touched us with his hard work, perseverance and passion for table tennis."

USATT News Items
They have added NINETEEN new items since yesterday! So rather than link to some of them myself, why not go to the USATT News Page and browse them over? Or you can go directly to the USATT pages for each. (Numbers 5-7 were in my blog yesterday – I wrote #5 and 6.)

  1. How Rockstar Games Made Ping Pong Cool
  2. Ma Long Getting Ready for Rio
  3. Physical Exercise for Table Tennis
  4. Table tennis making way to Arctic Winter Games
  5. Butterfly MDTTC June Open
  6. Will Shortz – 50 States, 1348 Consecutive Days!
  7. 2200 vs 2600
  8. Sportfist Online table tennis tournament software
  9. AceBounce, The Loop's Relaxed Ping Pong Restaurant, Has A Serious Menu
  10. Village residents make strong showing in table tennis tourney
  11. 3 US Umpires Pass 2016 IU Exams
  12. Alabama Juniors Compete in New York
  13. USA Boys Invited to Japan
  14. 2016 ITTF World Hopes Week and Challenge
  15. David Rockwell Wins Tony Award for Best Scenic Design of a Musical
  16. Eau Claire Wisconsin Selected to Host 2017 Collegiate Table Tennis Championships
  17. United Nations win the Tai Shan Cup 2016 Team Event!
  18. 11 Questions with Eric Pattison
  19. ICC Table Tennis Center raises $150K to send athletes to the Rio Olympics

Hunter College High School Table Tennis Club
Here's their Facebook page, with lots of pictures! I wonder how many high school table tennis clubs have their own webpage or Facebook page?

Table Tennis Psychic
Here's the video (1:29) of Adam Bobrow predicting in advance – in writing – where his opponent will hit his next three serves. It's sort of a parlor magic trick, except, of course, he's just using spinny serves against a beginner – but the presentation is excellent. I do the same trick all the time, but with a slightly different presentation. Normally I either station kids on either side – once with catcher mitts! – and tell them to catch the ball, and then serve sidespin both ways. The other way is I put a box of ball on the left, and there's a water fountain on the right where I usually coach. Before each serve I say, "The ball's lonely," and serve so they hit toward the box of balls, or "The ball's thirsty," and serve so it goes to the water fountain, or I say, "Can you promise me one thing, please, please, please don't put this in the net!" as I serve backspin.

Table Tennis Dress-Up
Here's the article (actually titled "All American Air Table Tennis Classic") where you'll see pictures of table tennis players dressed up as mutant turtles, American pilgrims, and a chicken playing with a pot ("Chicken Pot Pong"?).

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