November 16, 2016

Miscellaneous Stuff
I think I've been fighting a minor cold the last few days. This morning I woke up with my head feeling like it was full of cotton, a minor background headache that won't go away, sniffles, and a general feeling of "I should be in bed." Today's a slow day for me - I only have one hour of coaching today - so I should be able to do that. I'm also going to try to get some writing done.

Meanwhile, the Washington Post came in yesterday for the follow-up to their previous visit. This time they had both a writer and a photographer, who took pictures for three hours. So far they have interviewed me, Cheng Yinghua (the focus of the story, along with MDTTC), Jack Huang, Ryan Dabbs, Tiffany Ke, and Lisa Lin. They took many pictures yesterday of these players and coaches, plus lots of shots of 8-year-old Stanley Hsu (about 1350) smacking balls against Cheng. The article will most likely come out next week.

I had a great 90-minute session with Daniel Sofer, recently turned 12, and told him afterwards that if he trained like that all the time, he'd soon be battling with the best players his age in the country. "Soon," of course, is a relative term. He's about 1700 right now, with a great feel for the ball, but still lacks confidence in his attack.  

My upcoming schedule is going to be massively travelish. (Yeah, I made up that word.) I'll blog about this later, but the short version (not in chronological order) is that over the next six weeks I'll be coaching for three days at the North American Teams; attending USATT board meetings and the U.S. Open in Las Vegas for eight days (plus a USATT teleconference next Monday); helping run our Christmas Camp for six days; attending the Philadelphia Science Fiction Convention for two days (that's this Friday and Saturday); attending a science fiction writing workshop in a cruise in the Bahamas for five days (!); and spending Christmas in Eugene, Oregon for five days. In between I'll be doing the usual coaching, USATT/MDTTC stuff, and blogging and other writing. And fighting this stupid cold….

2017-18 Youth National Team Trials Procedures Draft for Public Comment
Here's the document from the USATT High Performance Committee. I think it's great that they are putting it up for public comment in this way before finalizing it, though of course it means they'll also have to deal with lots of commentary. I haven't had a chance to go over this yet, but will soon, and will likely blog about it. But I really don't know what's in it. Ooh, the anticipation!!!

World Championships of Ping Pong Official Entry Form
Here's the info page for this sandpaper event to be held on Saturday morning, Dec. 17, at the U.S. Open. (One small mistake that they will likely fix – it has the entry fee as $20, but it's only $10 for those entered in the U.S. Open, which would probably be true for nearly all the entries.) This is the Qualifier for the USA sandpaper team that will go to the $100,000 World Ping-Pong Championships, which will be held Jan. 28-29, 2017 in London. I plan to take part in the USA Trials, and will destroy all those who oppose me unless of course they happen to win.

Can China's Table Tennis Team Be Beaten?
Here's the article by Eli Baraty.

Training Video: Samson Dubina and Jiwei Xia
Here's the video (3:12).

Interview with a Guy Who Once Played Ping Pong with Prince
Here's the article.

Table Tennis Looking to Bounce Back
Here's the article on Alabama (and Louisiana) Table Tennis, and Hurricane Katrina.

Family Fun: Table tennis is Fun and Easy to Learn
Here's the article.

Penn Ping Pong is Undefeated Against Local Universities
Here's the article.

Ma Long, King of Epic Shots
Here's the new video (5:19).

FIT Open, November 12-13, 2016
Here's the USATT article by Matt Hetherington. Here's the video (14:08) – Final between champion Kai Zhang and runner-up Kaden Xu, by Jules Apatini.

Top 10 Best Behind-the-Back Shots of All Time
Here's the video (2:45) from Table Tennis Daily.

Lots of Little Big-Eyed Red Creatures on the Ping-Pong Table
Here's the picture!

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