Using shadow drills
Training and Drills
parth limbachia Asked 11 years ago
Hi Alois,
I do not have a serious table tennis partner at home however I have time to practice everyday for 90 min.
In order to improve my footwork and technique is it good to use shadow drills instead of playing without a serious partner? Or should I alternate between playing one day with partner and one day without partner and practice only shadow drills? Does shadow drills really improve our forehand and backhand techniques and how often should I practice shadow drills?
Alois Rosario Answered 11 years ago
Hi Parth,
Shadow drills can help but not as much as hitting with a partner.
Can you train anyone you have at home to feed you multiball? This would be a lot better.
Thoughts on this question
Become a free member to post a comment about this question.
parth limbachia Posted 11 years ago
Alois,
What type of drills can I perform using Multiball? Is multiball drill better than footwork drills? What are the advantages of multiball drills over single ball drills? What should be the frequency of this this type of training?
Alois Rosario from PingSkills Posted 11 years ago
Hi Parth,
You can use a wide variety of drills. Take a look in our Free Downloads for our Training Drills download which presents all of the Training Drills presented in our Training Secrets lessons. Also look through these lessons for examples of drills to use.
You can replicate them with multi ball by getting your partner to feed the balls out in the patterns required.
You can do this type of training as often as you like. The more the better. If you have a good training partner that can keep the ball in play for you to train these drills this is in general more effective as it gives you the training of tracking the ball as well.
DHS Lover Posted 11 years ago
Erriza Shalahuddin Posted 11 years ago
A good discussion, I think. I read a scientific journal published by ITTF, "Effectiveness of Shadow Practice in Learning the Standard Table Tennis
Backhand Drive". The researchers compared the effectiveness the learning backhand counterhit through shadow practice and single ball backhand drill, both are combined with the multiball drill. The result was there was no significant different between those 2 groups. Based on this article, I dare to say that player can improve his/her technique through shadow practice. However, it's not without drawback. I think training solely through shadow practice has a risk developing wrong technique and ineffective strokes, and once this thing occur, it's hard to unlearn your learned technique. Therefore, player still need partner/trainer to monitor the progress.
Alois Rosario from PingSkills Posted 11 years ago
Hi Erriza,
Is this the article you are talking about?
http://www.ittf.com/ittf_science/SSCenter/docs/199208005%20-%20Holder%20-%20Preliminary%20Investigation.pdf.
This seems to be a slightly different situation to the generally held view of shadow play.
Ujjal Chatterjee Posted 8 years ago
The rhythm or the speed at which the 'Shadow Practice needs to be done is very clear in your video.
Thank you so much.
kathy mckelvey Posted 8 years ago
Interesting. Thank you!!
Vinh Cao duy Posted 8 years ago
It's in reality. Thanks
Levent AKIN Posted 8 years ago
For body awareness and relaxation these are helpful for me. One can find problems about rotation of arm, tension in the shoulder and other things. Getting rid of unnecessary movements, focusing on balance. I believe a mirror is also necessary. As the weight lifters check the execution of a movement in the mirror.
Patrik Schmuki Posted 8 years ago
But don't you think if you have that much time available a day it would be better to consider purchasing a robot?
(by the way how is the PingSkills supported robot coming along?)
Alois Rosario from PingSkills Posted 8 years ago
Hi Patrick,
A variety of activity is good. The shadow swings can give you feedback without the pressure off hitting the ball.
The Trainerbot sounds like it is coming along well. They are in China at the moment.