Practice and Progession
Training and Drills
Phil DeNegri Asked 8 years ago
Good Afternnon
I have started to play regularly again after not playing for years. I am 41 and play at a local community center with about 7 or 8 guys who are a lot older then me on MWF for about 2 hours. I have progressed a lot from being beaten easily to being the one who doesn't lose at all. My frustration is that when we get together to play, its is obviously competitive and you don't want to lose so there is no opportunity to practice shots and so forth. I found on youtube similar to this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcCiRfmYX5Q&spfreload=10 but it is portable. a few times i would go in early and practice my forehand and backhand and that helped. I am looking on craigslist to find a used table for my basement and then be able to practice more. My question is will practicing my forehand and backhand loop with a return board allow me to get better consistency then once I play I will be able to hit with more force? Thanks alot!!!
Phil DeNegri
Alois Rosario Answered 8 years ago
Hi Phil,
Well done on your progress.
I am not a fan of the return board. I think it is limited as to the hitting you can do. A simple robot would be a better option I think.
The return board only allows you to hit at a certain pace and the consistency of it depends on your accuracy.
There are some simple robots that sit on the table that are relatively cost effective.
The best option by far though is if you could find someone out of the group that will come over and hit with you once you have a table.
Thoughts on this question
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Tony Dixon Posted 8 years ago
Without a doubt a robot is the best way to practice and improve your table tennis strokes. Unlike a living person, a robot is ever ready and tireless. You can get more practice in ten minutes on a robot than in a month of playing matches. In other words you can groove a stroke effortlessly. The only danger is grooving the wrong actions; but if a stroke feels right, it probably is.
Josef Novy Posted 8 years ago
I thought this also Tony, but unfortunately robots have significant bad sides. Now I prefer multiball much more. Often untypical balls (not playable by human oponents - i.e. too heavy spin), and still the same balls not forcing you to watch the balls and adapt to small changes in speed and spin and not giving the typical steps in the game - push, topspin against backspin, block and topspin against block with their differences. Also you see the robot head, so you know where the ball is going to go.
Nowadays I think robots are only good if you have to learn the basic swing or if you have no training partner, which would be willing to make exercises, not just to play matches.