June 8, 2006
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Courtesy Coach Mark Nordby |
To start, please film yourself in 3 different situations. A) practicing just your strokes, B) playing a tough PRACTICE match at your club, C) playing several tournament matches against a range of ratings - this will help show any obvious changes in your game. You should then discuss these films with a trusted and knowledgeable coach. For those players that do not have this luxury, I would suggest that you ask yourself these types of questions when watching your own videos. These are in no specific order of importance.
1) Are your strokes similar to how they look in the practice video? If not, you definitely need to spend more time memorizing solid strokes. If you are not sure what a good stroke is, pick a local pro that impresses you and try to copy his strokes or take some lessons.
2) Are you really moving to an optimal position for each shot or just doing a lot of reaching? Film a high level player (with a style you would like to play) and compare his movements with yours.
3) Are you serving to MANY locations (early in match to probe for weaknesses) with a variety of different spins? Use the entire table!
4) Do you understand an opponent’s strengths and weaknesses quickly and then attempt to use this information in some specific manner?
5) How is your shot selection? Are you looking to attack (loop) weak medium long serves? After serving, are you looking to use your strengths immediately? Are you adjusting to difficult serves/situations or making the same mistakes repeatedly?
A great way to improve is to practice using different shots to return the same serves. Even though a specific shot may work against your friend, try to use something completely different to learn a new response. It could come in very handy against another opponent.
6) Are you aiming your shots to most effectively hand-cuff your opponent or are you just swinging and hoping for the best? Are you going at their middle or wide of their backhand and forehand hitting zones? It can be very difficult to decide which shot to play next when someone keeps attacking towards your playing elbow.
7) As you are watching, try to think creatively for ways you could have adjusted your own play or shot selection to possibly change the outcome of a match. For example, several years ago I was playing a 2250 rated penhold pips all-out hitter. He would serve deep fast side-under and side-top to my middle or wide backhand and I would counter or loop as well as I could consistently, and then he would flat-kill it quite easily. He won the first game 21-8. To adjust, I tried to push heavy and light (this was tough to do as I like my backhand loop) to all locations on his serves and suddenly he missed some shots and started to lose his rhythm. This then changed the whole match. I then went back to some looping as well. My point is to show that any adjustments you can make on your own can be incredibly valuable. Do not be afraid to try different responses to any situation that is not working in your favor.
General comments about video:
I think most of us would agree that tournaments are vital to all players’ development and therefore, I would suggest that you tape more of your tournament matches. There is no better way to utilize your spending $$$ than to be able to replay many of your matches and learn from them over and over instead of TRYING to remember what really occurred in a long day of intense battling. You do not need an expensive, fancy camera. I still have my VHS-c (a dinosaur from the early 90’s). The angle you film from, though, is important. For a right-handed player, place your camera behind from the right corner of the table at eye level. This will help you to see everything without blocking the camera with your body.
If you analyze matches fairly regularly, you will always know what strokes need further development and your decision-making will get much sharper especially in returning serve.
