May 18, 2026

Tip of the Week
Develop an Overpowering Strength.

Frictionless Antispin and Long Pips
Due to problems with my right knee, I’m having difficulty playing my normal forehand attack game. (It might also have something to do with being 66, born in the last full year of the Eisenhower Administration.) So, I’ve been dabbling with long pips ox (no sponge) and frictionless antispin. The long pips actually fit my game very well, since I mostly just block on the backhand. I’ve resisted switching to it for decades since I’m a coach, and I’m a better practice partner with inverted on both sides. Before, as a full-time coach, I’d often hit with our top players as I coached them. Now I only do group sessions where I’m either walking around, feeding multiball, or acting as a practice partner for our beginning and intermediate players, only occasionally hitting with our top players. I can easily switch back to inverted when I hit with these players, ranging from beginner to perhaps 1800.

I’m actually somewhat experienced with long pips as I’ve used them many times as a practice partner for decades. I have two huge racket cases full of rackets to pull out as needed when players need to practice against a specific surface, and they include long pips no sponge (for blocking), long pips with 1mm sponge (for chopping), and one with medium-long pips (both blocking and hitting). The only problem is that the thinness of the surface messes up my grip, and the lowered weight messes up my timing. However, I’ve been experimenting with the grip and getting used to the weight.

The frictionless antispin was a surprise. (And I thought I knew everything about table tennis!) With long pips, I mostly chop-block, with maximizes the amount of spin I return, and gives great control. Once you understand how long pips works, it’s all intuitive. But frictionless antispin is seemingly non-intuitive. As I learned both in practice and in online articles and discussions, a chop-block lowers the amount of spin you return. Think about it – someone loops at you with heavy topspin. If I chop down on the ball at contact, you’d think I’d return more spin, but that actually deadens the spin, and so you return it with less backspin. But if I just stick the racket out and let the ball hit it straight on, it returns almost all of the spin, and is most effective. (But I feel like I lose some control that way.) It’s mind-bogglingly weird.

At this point I’m leaning toward either 1) long pips ox, or 2) maybe, just maybe, if my knee seems more or less okay and I don’t feel 100 years old, inverted again. We’ll see. I’ll be in Over 65 at the Nationals in July. I’ll also be in the hardbat events.

 

Ping-Pong Paddles Can’t Talk!

The inside illustrations look great! They are almost all done, but some need minor corrections. The book should be out by June 15. As noted previously, it’s a humorous Seussian rhyming children’s picture book that introduces table tennis to kids. It features a nervous boy and his talking paddle in their first tournament, where he meets and plays a girl who is really good, and they have an adventurous match. Along the way, kids learn about the sport, with themes on facing your fears, working toward a goal, honesty, and friendship.

I plan to send copies to table tennis bloggers. If interested, email me! I’m also toying with advertising in USATT’s Table Tennis Insider.

One strange thing – I’d like to advertise somewhere on the ITTF webpage. I’ve emailed them a number of times this past month with their Contact Us page and various other emails listed on their webpages, but no response. Jeez, I want to give them money and they don’t seem to want it!!! If any ITTF people read this, please email me and perhaps we can figure out how I can send them large sums of cash.

Meanwhile, while you (or at least the kids in our sport) anxiously await this book, don’t forget about my other table tennis books!

World Team Championships
They were held Apr. 28 – May 10 in London. Here are some links.

Here are articles by Steve Hopkins/Butterfly, most recent first.

Behind The Scenes of the World Championships 2026
Here’s the video (15:53) from Andreas Levenko.

How Coaches Learned From the Elite at London 2026
Here’s the article from Table Tennis England.

Major League Table Tennis

New from Butterfly

How to Forehand Counterloop
Here’s the video (2:57) with Milo de Boer from acceleraq.

New from Ti Long

New from the Table Tennis Teaching Channel

Average to Pro Serve in 7 Days!
Here’s the video (7:27) from Table Tennis Daily.

PingSunday/EmRatThich
29 videos this past week, and dozens more before that from the Worlds.

New from PingSkills
Ask the Coach.

New from Steve Hopkins/Butterfly
(Note – articles on Worlds are in World Team Championships segment.)

Formulation of Fitness Norms for Skill-Specific Components in Table Tennis Performance
Here’s the technical article, care of Kevin Finn at Peak Performance Table Tennis, from the International Journal of Original Recent Advanced Research, an “International Peer Reviewed Journal.”

Two Humorous Table Tennis Sites

I Challenged Google
Here’s the video (14:48) from Adam Bobrow!

New Sales & Publications – Drabbles!
I’m now a professional drabblist. What’s a drabble, you ask? It’s one of those small niche markets – it’s a story that’s exactly 100 words long. Here are two that I sold and were published this past week. Both have historical references. See if you can get both. Hint for the second one – it’s a reference to a song. But don’t spend too much time on it, the years go by swiftly.

***
Send us your own coaching news!