Michael R. Wong's Training and BATTF Experience
April 2, 2010

Michael R. Wong & his BATTF League Team

My name is Michael R. Wong and I am a 13 year old student of the World Champions Table Tennis Academy. I live in Sacramento / California and even though there are good players there; there are practically no juniors that play at the intermediate and advanced levels. Therefore, in June of 2009, I enrolled with my father in one of the World Champions TT Academy five-day long training camps. This was an extremely intense but beneficial camp for honing my fundamentals. It was a pleasure working with Stefan Feth, who turned out to be a funny guy. It was around this time that I started taking private lessons with Stefan as well. Later on, I worked with all four of the coaches (Li Zhen Shi, Zhang Li and Nan Li) at the Academy.

In August of 2009, Stefan asked me if I wanted to be a part of his Division 6 team in the BATTF League. The BATTF is an organization formed in 2006 by four table tennis players who wanted formal competition between the San Francisco Bay Area clubs. These four were Bruce Liu, Khoa Nguyen, Stefan Feth, and Rajul Sheth. I was extremely surprised and honored. My rating at the time when he asked me was only 1358 and I was going to join Larry Yang, Mathew J. Li, and Aditi Chodri, all of whom were all more experienced players than I was. Stefan felt that we were good enough to compete in the adult league. Most Saturdays from September 2009 to March 2010, we played a series of four singles and one doubles matches against different San Francisco Bay Area table tennis teams. There was a lot of rivalry, tension and pressure, but also a lot of excitement, fun, and team camaraderie. Right from the get go there was tremendous support from all of my teammates. Everyone cheered for each other, especially in close games. Our parents also cheered for us. Some of the team matches were very close, especially against the team from Pleasanton where the final team score was 3-2 in our favor.

Stefan was absolutely right when he told us before the season that the Team League atmosphere will help everyone to raise their level of play. Being able to play matches on a regular basis gave me great feedback on what I need to work on in the upcoming training sessions. I also learned that table tennis can be a team sport and it is much more fun to win as a team.

Starting in January of 2010, the Academy organized an invitational Elite Jr. Program every Saturday and Sunday for some of the very best junior players in the Bay Area. I was surprised I was invited to join them. Like the private lessons and the BATTF matches, this junior elite training really honed my fundamentals, match strategy, and mental game. I was able to play many high level players, including a current US National Team Member. Last week, we played the Play Off Finals against a team from the East Bay who gave us so much difficulty in November 2009. Our final score which clinched us the Championship Title for the Division 6 in the BATTF was 15 games us and only one game for them. Another team from the Academy that is in the Play Off Finals plays in Division 2, which consists of Natalie Sun, Brian Chen, Prachi Jha, Wim Coekaerts, and Mike Chen.

All of this training over the past 9 months has raised my USATT rating from 1358 to 1697. Larry Yang’s (my doubles partner) USATT rating over the same time period jumped from 968 to 1815. This unique training program of private lessons, the BATTF Team League competition, the World Champions Training Camps and the Elite Jr. Program will make all of the junior participants at the Academy a potent force in the San Francisco Bay Area scene for decades to come.