I see one glaring flaw with a specific backhand of yours: When you're swinging your hardest with your backhand, you're flicking your wrist too much, causing the ball to go long, especially when you're aiming up the middle, or down the line and you're closer to the table. Try to remember to turn your hips on the backhand and use a little less wrist. Turn your left hip backwards as you backswing on the backhand. Then, rotate your hips along with your backhand swing, meaning bring your left hip forward and your right hip backward. This will give you more control when you're using power with your backhand.
Hoping to get back to tournament play next season. This is great inspiration. Love the honest and analytical commentary too. Congratulations on the win.
Congratulations on winning the Division A Open Singles over Matthew at the Manitoba Open! It's nice to have a new champion as Matthew is always winning these tournaments as he is a big fish in a small ocean. I look forward to your return in June to win again. Are you a full time professional player or do you have a daytime job?
Hi, what country do you play in? Because in Germany 2500 would be Bundesliga. Players like Falck, Gerassimenko, Freitas and so on have about a 2500 ranking
As far as your forehand goes: Just remember to keep your elbow more steady as you swing. Don't allow it to move all over the place. I see all the ones that you're missing and your elbow is moving all over the place and that's one of the biggest reasons why you're missing. Also, try to keep your elbow a bit tighter into your body, even when you swing hard. This will force you to get the power from the ground. Plus, keeping your elbow closer to the body makes you able to get more spin on the ball, as you should be getting more brush contact on the ball. Extending your arm more causes you to make fatter contact on the ball (Like a smash contact), even though doing so causes your racket head speed to be higher. And believe it or not, getting a bit less speed on the racket head and more of a brush contact actually makes it so you're able to hit the ball just as hard, if not harder, except your ball actually comes down and hits the table. People don't seem to understand that heavier topspin causes the ball to move fast through the air, as well as hit the table and accelerate as it kicks forward. It also makes the ball move a lot as it travels to your opponent, making it harder for them to judge the location and the timing. This will also make you able to recover faster too, as keeping your elbow tighter to the body and under control throughout the swing stops you from over-swinging your arm, meaning you're able to recover more easily. You also seem to be backing up both feet when you know the receive is coming down the middle for you to play a forehand. The problem you're having is that you're backing up too far and your feet are too parallel to one another. This makes your body too closed for a quality forehand and the combination of problems makes you have to reach out and swing earlier, which makes your forehand lack quality and consistency. Try just stepping your right foot back instead. This will open your body up for the forehand and you will be the right distance from it too. Another thing I noticed is that your forehand rubber seems to throw the ball a bit low for your technique. Are you using a mechanical grip rubber? That's what it seems like. It seems like you're using something that's mechanical grip and 47.5 degrees or 50 degrees. These 40+ ABS balls change the game to where you'd be much better off using something hard and at least semi-tacky on your forehand. Perhaps the Andro C53, Butterfly Dignics 09c, or Tibhar Hybrid K3 would work better on your forehand. You're at too high of a level to use just mechanical grip on the forehand. However, you probably could benefit from using something like the Tibhar MX-P on the backhand, as it throws it low, which your backhand needs, it has a ton of speed capability, which will make your backhand harder to deal with, and it spins the most when putting in the least effort, which will help your backhand flick receives and your backhands from over the table. Now just remember that it's going to take about 2-3 months of using the new rubbers every day before you get really good with them. Don't be surprised when you're not IMMEDIATELY better with them than you are with your current setup. Finally, you're at the level where you should be using a blade with a typical Inner-ZLC composition. There's a reason why most of the top professional shakehands players use them. Patrick Franziska is a taller player with a similar overall style to yours. He uses an Inner-ZLC blade because it throws the ball straighter when he engages the carbon, because ZLC has the best power to weight ratio of all the carbons and that means that the blade still has plenty of power in it when swinging hard despite being inner-carbon, and because it still plays like an all-wood blade when serving and pushing. So, Inner-ZLC, a hard hybrid rubber on the FH, and the MX-P on the BH is what I am recommending for you in particular. And if the MX-P is a little too soft for the Inner-ZLC blade, then just go with the Dignics 05 on the backhand instead.
@@VladTableTennis I just saw some of it. Here's what I see: FH backswing is high level. However, you can tell how unsure you are about what trajectory it's going to come off at, should you REALLY swing at it. Do you know why you're unsure? It's because when you're making contact with the ball your right elbow isn't stable and because your follow-through is entirely with your right shoulder involved. What I want you to do is focus on getting your right elbow a just a tiny bit more tucked into your body as you start to actually swing forwardat the ball, especially on harder swings. Then, I want you to focus on making a little hip rotation just as you're about to make contact with the ball. And as you finish that rotation, you should also finish your follow-through virtually milliseconds afterwards. And one other thing I noticed is that you're too early on the contact with the FH. You're reaching out to the ball and that's something that takes away your ability to make contact with the most speed on the racket head, and that lowers the amount of spin, which, in turn, lowers how much power you can use. And remember this: To make a good brush contact on a counterattack and play back a competitive ball from the midrange against decent players YOU MUST SWING THAT RACKET VERY FAST THROUGH THE BALL WITH CONFIDENCE. Otherwise, you're either missing the shot, or giving them a meatball. When they have the attack and you're the counterattacker and you're in the midrange, play the forehands cross-table. Doing so gives you the most margin for error. Plus, you'll be able to get the best brush contact when aiming there, meaning you'll be able to spin it more, meaning you can hit it harder and it will come down, making your opponent's job tough. Only when you get a real beat on the ball, or when you have control of the attack, should you go for the inside-out forehand. And even then, going at their middle is going to be far more effective because that has a higher likelihood of making them either miss, or give you a meatball, than going to the inside-out corner does. (BTW, I have plenty to say about your BH in certain situations too. But for now, all I will say is that you should try ditching the D05 on the BH and go with a 47.5 degree 100% mechanical grip tensor rubber. This will increase the speed and spin of your BH from very close to the table and from over the table. Right now I can see that the harder sponge of that D05 is making your BH from close to the table and over the table too weak. The 47.5 degree sponge is softer and that means more spin and speed when less effort is put in. The harder sponge means that it requires more effort to get its speed and spin. Your playstyle isn't one that needs the harder sponge because you play your best BHs close to the table and over the table, not a bit off the table like the Chinese.)
You should try following a ketogenic diet, just in the sense that you cut out all complex carbs, mate. You can eat whatever else you want. Just cut out the complex carbs. It should help you drop off the weight that you need to drop in order to be at a more ideal TT weight. And you won't have to exercise more, or anything either. Plus, you should feel a lot more energetic when you play, as your diet is what controls your energy and your mood 100%. Cutting out complex carbs forces your body to start burning everything you eat right away for energy. This starts to happen roughly 2 weeks into cutting out the complex carbs. Once you trigger this process, you will start dropping weight big time and you'll start feeling far more energetic, as complex carbs are what makes you feel sluggish and it takes your body a long time to burn them off. Personally, I didn't do anything differently, except switch to a ketogenic diet and I dropped from 225lbs to 190lbs in just 4 weeks. I am roughly 1.87m tall, aka roughly 6 foot 1, or 6 foot 2. Idk how tall you are. But, you look to be a similar height to me. You look to be between 91-95kg, aka 200-210lbs, aka 14.25-15 stone. With this in mind, your ideal weight would be 84kg, aka 185lbs, aka 13.2 stone. I see that you have your knee braced as well. If you drop the weight, you will have far less problems with joint pains overall, and you'll be putting far less pressure on the knee that I assume has been injured before. From the looks of it, you need to drop around 11-14kg, aka roughly 25-30lbs, aka roughly 1.8-2.15 stone (I believe that should cover all the weight measurements so that you'll understand one of them, and for anyone else who may read this). I'm only saying this because I see the knee brace and I know that dropping the weight is the way to take a lot of pressure off that knee.
Can't believe someone is talking shit about your forehand, most commenters probably don't have half the forehand you have. I also think people focus too much on how a shot looks and less on the quality on the outcoming ball, which is really what matters. There are pros with forehands that look even goofier than you but their ball quality doesn't lie. I wouldn't pay any mind to those comments, everyone on the Internet has an opinion. There's no way they would be saying that to your face either.
Blocking. Letting me attack first. Sorry, should’ve explained it better lol But basically he was letting me open the attack first, and he was looking for counters. Never meant like actual defender
@taureanlloyd925 it's like he will let you flick, open up for him to placement block, he will flick or open up with spin and then continue block with his reflex and count on opponent's mistakes. Those people are kinda scary too if they are very consistent, it's like they can't put a ball outside table. A pros that has that playstyle would be Ander Linds, etc.
I don't think the problem is your rubber. They are fast, with a lot of control, ideal for people of your level. Perhaps it is the wood that lacks more control.
was awesome meeting you at the tournament :)!!
My man!
It was a pleasure!
This series is absolute perfection!
Appreciate big homie!
I see one glaring flaw with a specific backhand of yours: When you're swinging your hardest with your backhand, you're flicking your wrist too much, causing the ball to go long, especially when you're aiming up the middle, or down the line and you're closer to the table. Try to remember to turn your hips on the backhand and use a little less wrist. Turn your left hip backwards as you backswing on the backhand. Then, rotate your hips along with your backhand swing, meaning bring your left hip forward and your right hip backward. This will give you more control when you're using power with your backhand.
Hoping to get back to tournament play next season. This is great inspiration. Love the honest and analytical commentary too.
Congratulations on the win.
Thank you so much!✊🏼
Awsome commentry. Good to see you getting into share and moving comfortably.
Thank you!
It was nice meeting and playing you Vlad! All the best!
Thanks Kevin!
your first opponent plays at a club near me in Germany😂 what a coincidence😮 Been loving the series keep up the grind😊
Cool! Kevin is awesome! Thanks for watching!
Love these vids and your commentary! Do you plan on playing in Ontario?
Maybe in the future, if u have good tournaments lol
Congratulations on winning the Division A Open Singles over Matthew at the Manitoba Open! It's nice to have a new champion as Matthew is always winning these tournaments as he is a big fish in a small ocean. I look forward to your return in June to win again. Are you a full time professional player or do you have a daytime job?
I do work part-time as a coach. And full time as a financial manager at a car dealership
Congrats Vlad, I really want to see you play In 1 WTT tournament
Hopefully it will happen soon
wake up new road to wtt vid
Yessir
Hello. Plz, note what equipment you play. TY)
For sure he is using a Boll ALC Blade.
Rubbers idk.
Would be nice to know^^
Edit: other comment: D09c & D05
Hi, what country do you play in? Because in Germany 2500 would be Bundesliga. Players like Falck, Gerassimenko, Freitas and so on have about a 2500 ranking
His rating must be in TTCAN since he is in Canada
I play in Canada, the highest ranking we have is like 3500. Matthew, my finals opponent is 3000.
First guy is Alexis Lebrun
Yeah for sure lol
As far as your forehand goes: Just remember to keep your elbow more steady as you swing. Don't allow it to move all over the place. I see all the ones that you're missing and your elbow is moving all over the place and that's one of the biggest reasons why you're missing. Also, try to keep your elbow a bit tighter into your body, even when you swing hard. This will force you to get the power from the ground. Plus, keeping your elbow closer to the body makes you able to get more spin on the ball, as you should be getting more brush contact on the ball. Extending your arm more causes you to make fatter contact on the ball (Like a smash contact), even though doing so causes your racket head speed to be higher. And believe it or not, getting a bit less speed on the racket head and more of a brush contact actually makes it so you're able to hit the ball just as hard, if not harder, except your ball actually comes down and hits the table. People don't seem to understand that heavier topspin causes the ball to move fast through the air, as well as hit the table and accelerate as it kicks forward. It also makes the ball move a lot as it travels to your opponent, making it harder for them to judge the location and the timing. This will also make you able to recover faster too, as keeping your elbow tighter to the body and under control throughout the swing stops you from over-swinging your arm, meaning you're able to recover more easily.
You also seem to be backing up both feet when you know the receive is coming down the middle for you to play a forehand. The problem you're having is that you're backing up too far and your feet are too parallel to one another. This makes your body too closed for a quality forehand and the combination of problems makes you have to reach out and swing earlier, which makes your forehand lack quality and consistency. Try just stepping your right foot back instead. This will open your body up for the forehand and you will be the right distance from it too.
Another thing I noticed is that your forehand rubber seems to throw the ball a bit low for your technique. Are you using a mechanical grip rubber? That's what it seems like. It seems like you're using something that's mechanical grip and 47.5 degrees or 50 degrees. These 40+ ABS balls change the game to where you'd be much better off using something hard and at least semi-tacky on your forehand. Perhaps the Andro C53, Butterfly Dignics 09c, or Tibhar Hybrid K3 would work better on your forehand. You're at too high of a level to use just mechanical grip on the forehand. However, you probably could benefit from using something like the Tibhar MX-P on the backhand, as it throws it low, which your backhand needs, it has a ton of speed capability, which will make your backhand harder to deal with, and it spins the most when putting in the least effort, which will help your backhand flick receives and your backhands from over the table. Now just remember that it's going to take about 2-3 months of using the new rubbers every day before you get really good with them. Don't be surprised when you're not IMMEDIATELY better with them than you are with your current setup.
Finally, you're at the level where you should be using a blade with a typical Inner-ZLC composition. There's a reason why most of the top professional shakehands players use them. Patrick Franziska is a taller player with a similar overall style to yours. He uses an Inner-ZLC blade because it throws the ball straighter when he engages the carbon, because ZLC has the best power to weight ratio of all the carbons and that means that the blade still has plenty of power in it when swinging hard despite being inner-carbon, and because it still plays like an all-wood blade when serving and pushing.
So, Inner-ZLC, a hard hybrid rubber on the FH, and the MX-P on the BH is what I am recommending for you in particular. And if the MX-P is a little too soft for the Inner-ZLC blade, then just go with the Dignics 05 on the backhand instead.
I use Dignics 09C on FH and 05 on BH.
Let me know how my FH looks in the new video!
@@VladTableTennis I just saw some of it.
Here's what I see: FH backswing is high level. However, you can tell how unsure you are about what trajectory it's going to come off at, should you REALLY swing at it. Do you know why you're unsure? It's because when you're making contact with the ball your right elbow isn't stable and because your follow-through is entirely with your right shoulder involved. What I want you to do is focus on getting your right elbow a just a tiny bit more tucked into your body as you start to actually swing forwardat the ball, especially on harder swings. Then, I want you to focus on making a little hip rotation just as you're about to make contact with the ball. And as you finish that rotation, you should also finish your follow-through virtually milliseconds afterwards. And one other thing I noticed is that you're too early on the contact with the FH. You're reaching out to the ball and that's something that takes away your ability to make contact with the most speed on the racket head, and that lowers the amount of spin, which, in turn, lowers how much power you can use.
And remember this: To make a good brush contact on a counterattack and play back a competitive ball from the midrange against decent players YOU MUST SWING THAT RACKET VERY FAST THROUGH THE BALL WITH CONFIDENCE. Otherwise, you're either missing the shot, or giving them a meatball.
When they have the attack and you're the counterattacker and you're in the midrange, play the forehands cross-table. Doing so gives you the most margin for error. Plus, you'll be able to get the best brush contact when aiming there, meaning you'll be able to spin it more, meaning you can hit it harder and it will come down, making your opponent's job tough. Only when you get a real beat on the ball, or when you have control of the attack, should you go for the inside-out forehand. And even then, going at their middle is going to be far more effective because that has a higher likelihood of making them either miss, or give you a meatball, than going to the inside-out corner does.
(BTW, I have plenty to say about your BH in certain situations too. But for now, all I will say is that you should try ditching the D05 on the BH and go with a 47.5 degree 100% mechanical grip tensor rubber. This will increase the speed and spin of your BH from very close to the table and from over the table. Right now I can see that the harder sponge of that D05 is making your BH from close to the table and over the table too weak. The 47.5 degree sponge is softer and that means more spin and speed when less effort is put in. The harder sponge means that it requires more effort to get its speed and spin. Your playstyle isn't one that needs the harder sponge because you play your best BHs close to the table and over the table, not a bit off the table like the Chinese.)
Well played, big dogg
Thanks!
You should try following a ketogenic diet, just in the sense that you cut out all complex carbs, mate. You can eat whatever else you want. Just cut out the complex carbs. It should help you drop off the weight that you need to drop in order to be at a more ideal TT weight. And you won't have to exercise more, or anything either. Plus, you should feel a lot more energetic when you play, as your diet is what controls your energy and your mood 100%. Cutting out complex carbs forces your body to start burning everything you eat right away for energy. This starts to happen roughly 2 weeks into cutting out the complex carbs. Once you trigger this process, you will start dropping weight big time and you'll start feeling far more energetic, as complex carbs are what makes you feel sluggish and it takes your body a long time to burn them off. Personally, I didn't do anything differently, except switch to a ketogenic diet and I dropped from 225lbs to 190lbs in just 4 weeks. I am roughly 1.87m tall, aka roughly 6 foot 1, or 6 foot 2. Idk how tall you are. But, you look to be a similar height to me. You look to be between 91-95kg, aka 200-210lbs, aka 14.25-15 stone. With this in mind, your ideal weight would be 84kg, aka 185lbs, aka 13.2 stone.
I see that you have your knee braced as well. If you drop the weight, you will have far less problems with joint pains overall, and you'll be putting far less pressure on the knee that I assume has been injured before.
From the looks of it, you need to drop around 11-14kg, aka roughly 25-30lbs, aka roughly 1.8-2.15 stone (I believe that should cover all the weight measurements so that you'll understand one of them, and for anyone else who may read this). I'm only saying this because I see the knee brace and I know that dropping the weight is the way to take a lot of pressure off that knee.
Are you back to playing T05 hard/T05?
Nope.
Dignics 09C / Dignics 05 setup still. And I like it!
Can't believe someone is talking shit about your forehand, most commenters probably don't have half the forehand you have.
I also think people focus too much on how a shot looks and less on the quality on the outcoming ball, which is really what matters. There are pros with forehands that look even goofier than you but their ball quality doesn't lie.
I wouldn't pay any mind to those comments, everyone on the Internet has an opinion. There's no way they would be saying that to your face either.
That was a funny comment btw, so that’s why I brought it up lol.
It definitely didn’t bother me, but also, I think my FH could be improved as well
Congrats Vlad! Whoop Whoop!
My guy!
Steven was a defensive style player. How?
Blocking. Letting me attack first.
Sorry, should’ve explained it better lol
But basically he was letting me open the attack first, and he was looking for counters.
Never meant like actual defender
@@VladTableTennis he more like an allrounder or control player
Yeah, but I’m speaking more from how he tried to play me. And when he played us in doubles.
But he is definitely good
@taureanlloyd925 it's like he will let you flick, open up for him to placement block, he will flick or open up with spin and then continue block with his reflex and count on opponent's mistakes. Those people are kinda scary too if they are very consistent, it's like they can't put a ball outside table. A pros that has that playstyle would be Ander Linds, etc.
congrats!
Thanks!
I don't think the problem is your rubber. They are fast, with a lot of control, ideal for people of your level. Perhaps it is the wood that lacks more control.
Nah, what I was referring to my rubber that I’m playing with is worn out. I’m playing with the same one since August lol
Please let me know if you visit Uzbekistan 🇺🇿 by any chance, so we can play together
For sure
I need to know… what national team
Canada
i am canada u13 national team
@@VladTableTennis
.... why table tennis gym with white walls... lololol
Facts, that’s was confusing.
But, it’s actually not that distracting