Smart Phones and Smart Coaching

Well, I've finally done it. I've bought a smart phone. I've fought the temptation and peer pressure long enough, knowing that once I got one, there'd be no going back. I'm now entering the 24-hour online world, where coaches can check email while students are chasing after balls and perhaps watch a Disney movie on their phone while feeding multiball. 

I'm used to the idea of checking email when I get home from coaching; now I'll be able to do so at any time. I'm not sure this is a good thing. But there's no going back. I've fallen to the dark side - they have cookies. 

I've used smart phones in my coaching. Just a few days ago I had one of my students use his cell phone to video his forehand loop so he could see how he wasn't rotating his hips into the shot. I'll likely be doing this more often. I plan to get a tripod to make this easier. Isn't there an app for coaches to make it easier to video students? (Who'll be the first to find me that link? Email me!) 

Are We Done Yet?/Can We Practice More?

It's always interesting to see the different attitudes. Recently I had a session with two younger kids, who took turns, one doing multiball, the other ball pickup. One didn't try very hard except in spurts, kept asking what time it was, kept close track of how much longer he had to practice, and tried to bargain to leave early. The other was silent throughout all this, practicing pretty hard. But when the session ended and the first kid raced away happily, the second one asked, "Can we practice more?" Since I didn't have another session for 30 minutes, we did an extra 20 minutes (no charge). He got some good stroking and smashing practice. (We did it live, not multiball.)

You can always tell which ones will get good. Sure, there's talent (let's not start that argument for now!), but the ones who are determined to get good have this disturbing tendency to get good, while those who want to get out of practice or don't try have this weird tendency to not get good. I don't understand it!!!

On a related topic, long-time and older players often find themselves hitting the wall in their attempts to improve, even when they try hard. Often they start to give up, as even though they practice more (like the second kid above), they don't improve as much as they'd like. For those, I suggest taking a look at what they are practicing. I've seen players lose match after match because they couldn't block, and afterwards spent all their time practicing their attack. Or players who lose over and over because they couldn't return serves, and afterwards spent all their time practicing their attack. Or players who lose over and over because their serves are weak, and afterwards they spent all their time practicing their attack. (See a pattern?)

Backhand Serves From the Middle and Forehand Side

Over the last few days I've watched several players practice backhand serves. They worked really hard at it, and yet they were missing something. All four players only did the serve from the backhand corner. (They were all righties.) That's okay, but it's lacking. Germany's Dimitrij Ovtcharov might have the most effective backhand serve among top players, and he usually serves it from the middle and even the forehand side. Here's a video of him doing the serve, in slow motion. (The video is 3:12 long and shows all his serves, but the link should take you to his backhand serves, which start at 1:22 and go to the end.)

By serving from the middle or forehand side of the table (and we're again assuming righties – lefties adjust), you get the following:

Tip of the Week

How to Serve to the Backhand Attacking Receiver.

School is Back

And with that, the eleven weeks of summer training camps at MDTTC are over. It means that, once I catch up the zillion items on my short-term todo list, I'll have more time during the day to do all the USATT stuff I promised to do when I ran for the Board of Directors, as well as recent appointments as chair of the USATT League Committee and as Regional Associations Coordinator. (These are all unpaid, volunteer positions. What is wrong with me???) I'll be blogging about those activities now and then. Since I generally finish the blog Mon-Fri around 9:30 or 10AM, that means I have to do most of that work either between that time and 2:30PM, or at night after coaching. (I sometimes have free mornings on weekends, but not always.)

But it also means we start up our Afterschool Program again, and begin coaching kids after school, both as part of that program and in private lessons. I'll be leaving to pick up kids at 2:30 this afternoon. It's actually a slow day; I'll be done coaching today at 5PM.

That pesky short-term todo list is a bit irritating, as every time I cross something off, it seems like there are two more items on it. Today I've got a number "easy" things to take care of – after finishing the Tip of the Week and blog this morning, I'm off to run errands: bank, post office, haircut, and (I dread this) I'm thinking of finally stopping off at the Verizon Store and getting a smart phone. ("Come to the Dark Side! We have cookies and you're constantly online checking email, forums, web pages…") I probably should research Verizon smart phones first.

MDTTC Camps – Eleven Weeks Comes to an End Today

Today our eleven weeks of camps come to an end. We're finishing with a good-sized group, with about 40 players in all. Here's a camp photo from the Wednesday morning session, which is missing a few players who join us in the afternoon.

40+ Butterflies and JOOLAs and Nittakus and Double Fish and Xu Shaofao, Oh My!!!

We're still in the ongoing "Silly Season" (going on 1.5 years now), where training centers and clubs have deal with players training with multiple of the new plastic 40+ balls, which all play differently, and keep them all separate. Last night at MDTTC was illustrative. 

We're sponsored by Butterfly, and we're supposed to get plastic training balls in a month or so. Until then, we're still stuck using celluloid balls for much of our training. But as tournaments come up, things get complicated. We use Butterfly 40+ balls for our local tournaments, and since we had a tournament last weekend, guess what participants were training with the week before? But when the Teams in DC come up in November players will have to adjust to the JOOLA 40+ ball, and they play differently. And when the Open and Nationals come up, players will train with Nittaku Premium 40+ balls, which also play differently. 

Day Off to Work

Alas, I need a day off to catch up on the 314,159 things on my todo list – I'll have pi all over my face if I don't get them done soon. So no blog today – I'll be back tomorrow. Meanwhile, here are a few items! 

2015 USATT Hall of Fame Inductees and Lifetime Achievement Award

Here they are – and they include Coach Jack Huang from my club! (I may write more about this later. It's a big group this year – usually only 2-3 are inducted.)

Insane Rally

Here's the video (29 sec).

I Have No Idea What This Is

But here's the table tennis cartoon! Any suggestions for a caption?

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Samson Dubina on Boosting in Table Tennis

Here's the podcast (6 min), from Ben Larcombe at Expert Table Tennis. Here's my blog on boosting and my blog on hidden serves (one of many). Both contain my recommended solutions.

Here's a good analogy about what's happening in our sport. Suppose you trained for many years for the Olympic 100 meter dash. Then, in the final, as you took the starting blocks for the big race, the race official walks over and says, "Anyone who wants a two-meter head start, feel free to take it – it's against the rules, but we'll allow it." Now imagine nearly all the others moved two meters ahead, and you knew you had little chance of winning unless you joined them. But if you didn't, all those years of training and all your dreams are dashed because an official is allowing others to cheat. Guess what? That's exactly what's happening in our sport, both because of boosting and because of hidden serves.

I am so tired of watching this happen to players in our sport, especially up-and-coming juniors who play fair and are cheated out of titles by cheaters and those who allow the cheating.

We're honoring the cheaters and cheating the honorable.

I will be sending the proposals from my blogs on both of these to the USATT Rules Committee. I'll let you know what happens. Meanwhile, the following video also goes over all the cheating that's taking place at higher levels, but in a more humorous fashion.

Cheating in Table Tennis

Here's the hilarious video (6:05). Near the end there's a quote from Heywood Broun that all those players out there who hide their serves against opponents who do not should consider:

Tip of the Week

Vary Your Receive - Exhibit A: Receiving a Short Backspin Serve to the Forehand.

USATT Board Meeting in Chicago

On Friday morning I flew to Chicago for the USATT Board meeting, which took place Friday night and all day Saturday at the O'Hare Airport Hilton. I literally flew to the airport, walked across the street to the hotel, and the following day, immediately after the meeting ended, ran (because I was late for my flight, which I barely made) back across the street and flew home. Most of what I saw of Chicago was from the hotel window. 

Six of the nine USATT board members were present, including Carolyne Savini at her first meeting (replacing Jim Kahler), as well as myself, Peter Scudner, Mike Babuin, Kagin Lee, and Anne Cribbs. Also in attendance were CEO Gordon Kaye, High Performance Committee Chair Carl Danner, and USATT Legal Counsel Dennis Taylor. Two other board members (Ed Hogshead and Han Xiao) joined in by speakerphone at key times to take part in discussions and vote. (Missing was Ed Levy, who was in England.) This was important since there were a number of bylaw votes, which required 2/3 of the entire board - so six votes were needed, regardless of how many people were present. If five were present (a quorum, which allows a vote), and a bylaw "passes" 5-0, it doesn't pass - it misses by a vote. 

No Blog on Friday or Monday

I'm off on Friday morning to the USATT board meeting in Chicago. (See segment below.) I'll likely blog about it next week. I've also got a busy Sunday and have to coach Monday morning, so no blog Monday morning. See you on Tuesday!

Wednesday Coaching

Yesterday we did a lot of footwork drills, put-away drills, and serve practice. The new players are advancing rapidly, the intermediate players are becoming advanced, and the advanced players are trying to scare the Chinese out of their ping-pong socks.

Highlight of the day was easily the start of what was supposed to be lunch break at 1PM. But a strange thing happened - as I was picking up the last few balls and greatly looking forward to my Chicken Lo Mein, one of the kids asked if I would help him with his reverse pendulum serve. We worked on it for a few minutes, and then another joined us, and then another, and by 1:10 I was working with six kids on their serves during their break. (Average age was about nine.) We practiced serves as a group for until 1:45PM, and then we all finally went to lunch. (As well as a 7-11 run.) 

At the end of the afternoon session a bunch of the kids played the "Cup Game," where they built pyramids or forts out of paper cups, and then knocked them down as I fed multiball. The latest twist - they now have someone on permanent build mode, so while the kids take turns knocking it down, one of them furiously rebuilds the pyramids - to great hilarity when they knock it down and his hard work goes to naught. Here's a picture; moments later it was total destruction with dead and dying cups scattered everywhere.

Boosting, Part 2

Yesterday I posted about the problems with boosting. Here's a simple solution to the problem for USATT. (I've also added this as an addendum in yesterday's blog.) All we have to do is change the USATT Tournament Guide. Under Referee Responsibilities, it says:

5.h. Determines the legality of clothing and equipment. The USATT Dress Code and the red/black racket rule must be consistently enforced at all tournaments

If this were changed to the following, I think it would solve the problem. I’ve only added the last sentence, which I've bolded.

5.h. Determines the legality of clothing and equipment. The USATT Dress Code and the red/black racket rule must be consistently enforced at all tournaments. Any racket that passes the racket testing procedure would be considered legal for that tournament.

Tuesday's Coaching

We spent a lot of time on the backhand yesterday in the camp at MDTTC. The new players really picked it up quickly. The toughest case was the kid who played tennis, and kept turning sideways to hit backhands, tennis style.