If you’re a keen table tennis player, the table below might just blow your mind. We know the serve is important, but it’s much more important when you look closely at the statistics for competitive league players with an ITTF ranking of less than 2000. IKR? This is definitely food for thought – IF you […]
Archive for the 'Training and Drills' Category
The two previous posts focused on two different, but related Deliberate Practice Principles; the first to watch your opponent while he/she hits the ball and the second, to ANTICIPATE his/her next shot. Admittedly, the second is a lot harder to master. You’re in luck, you can learn to do this even when you’re not on […]
We’ve all heard the idiom: K.I.S.S. Keep It Super Simple. But what does it mean in our day-to-day lives? Today’s 1% Improvement is to be creative and use what you have. My community table tennis “room” has a white ball “scooper” to get the balls from under the table (shown below). I used a marker […]
One of the key foundational concepts of Deliberate Practice Principles is to observe the changes you’re making, as you’re making them. The before and after images below reveal the changes to a table tennis serve tactic to increase spin by adjusting the ball’s contact point towards the tip of the racket. This allows for the […]
We’ve all heard the saying “Perfect Practice Makes Perfect“, but until recently, it wasn’t clear WHY it had such a powerful and long-lasting effect on our brains. All competitive athletes understand the concept of Muscle Memory, but the reality is it’s Mental Memory that creates the instantaneous and autonomic reflexes that make champions. This is […]
If you weren’t sure if practicing makes a difference, here is an interesting chart showing that minutes make a difference. Of course if you are going to practice, you need to use Deliberate Practice techniques to make sure you are improving while you are practicing. Practice does NOT make perfect – Practice makes permanent. Only […]
In peak training phases, Michael Phelps will swim at least 80,000 meters a week, nearly 50 miles. That includes two practices a day, sometimes three when he was training at altitude. All elite athletes face the dilemma: How much is enough versus too much? Most athletes however it’s a case of too little and too […]
I recently visited a bookstore in Broadbeach on the Gold Coast (Australia), which has a great collection of used books, and found the ultimate squash classic by World Champion Jahangir Khan aptly named Winning Squash. Once you’ve mastered the basic strokes and court movement principles, as an elite squash player, you need to get into […]
