Service 201: Toss, Point of Contact, Depth and More (TB EP. 08)

Summary

In this video, the instructor continues a series on table tennis serves, focusing on universal principles rather than specific techniques. Key points include the importance of touching the ball at shoulder height for better camouflage, avoiding viral gimmicks like the 'ghost serve,' and understanding the depth and rhythm of serves to disrupt opponents. Emphasis is also placed on consistent ball tosses to maintain serve disguise. Practical demonstrations and quizzes are provided to help viewers grasp these concepts. The video aims to enhance viewers' serving skills and overall game strategy.

Takeaways

• 🏄‍♂️ The video is part of a miniseries on surf techniques, focusing on universal principles rather than specific techniques.
• 👐 The first principle is to touch the ball around shoulder height, which helps in camouflaging the serve.
• 🚫 Avoid touching the ball too far in front or behind the body, as it makes the serve too obvious.
• 🎯 The correct point of contact is crucial for disguising serves, making it harder for the opponent to read.
• 📉 Viral videos showing serves like the 'ghost serve' are often impractical in real matches because they are easy to return short.
• ⚖️ Vary the depth of your serves to avoid predictability and break the opponent's rhythm.
• 🔄 Change the point of contact on the racket to produce different spins and better camouflage the serve.
• 📏 Consistency in the toss is important for disguising the serve, regardless of whether it's short or long.
• 🔀 Mixing up serve speeds and placements helps in keeping the opponent guessing and off balance.
• 📹 The video emphasizes learning through observation and practice, and encourages viewers to comment with their thoughts and questions.

Q & A

What is the primary focus of the 'Surf 201' video?

The primary focus is on universal principles that apply to many serves, rather than specific techniques for particular serves.

What is the first key principle mentioned in the video?

The first key principle is to touch the ball around shoulder height, which helps in camouflaging the serve.

Why is it important to touch the ball at shoulder height when serving?

Touching the ball at shoulder height helps in camouflaging the serve, making it harder for the receiver to predict the serve type.

What common mistake do people make when learning a new serve?

A common mistake is touching the ball too far in front of or behind their body, which makes the serve less effective and easier to predict.

Why should you avoid trying viral serves like the 'ghost serve'?

Viral serves like the 'ghost serve' are not practical in matches because they are too easy to receive short, making them ineffective in real gameplay.

What is the second key point mentioned in the video?

The second key point is not to be fooled by viral videos of serves that look cool but are not practical for match play.

How can varying the depth of your serves improve your game?

Varying the depth of your serves helps in breaking the rhythm of your opponent and makes it more difficult for them to predict and receive the serves.

What is the third key point discussed in the video?

The third key point is to understand the difference between a serve in the short forehand, in the short forehand, and in the short forehand twice, emphasizing the importance of varying serve depth and placement.

How does changing the point of contact on the racket help in camouflaging serves?

Changing the point of contact on the racket (bottom for backspin, top for topspin, etc.) helps in disguising the type of spin and makes it harder for the opponent to read the serve.

What is the fourth key point about camouflaging serves?

The fourth key point is about camouflaging serves by changing the point of contact on the racket, which can alter the spin and make the serve less predictable.

Why is it important to keep your toss consistent when serving?

Keeping the toss consistent is crucial because it prevents the receiver from predicting whether the serve will be short or long based on the toss, adding another layer of camouflage.

What lesson did the speaker learn from playing tennis about serving?

The speaker learned the importance of a consistent toss from tennis, where hitting a specific target with the toss helped in achieving a reliable serve.

What is the fifth key point mentioned in the video?

The fifth key point is about maintaining a consistent toss to better camouflage serves and prevent the receiver from anticipating the serve's direction or length.

What is the overall goal of these serve videos according to the speaker?

The overall goal is to provide useful information and techniques to improve viewers' serving skills, making their serves more effective and harder to predict.

What does the speaker encourage viewers to do at the end of the video?

The speaker encourages viewers to leave comments with questions, suggestions for other videos, or additional insights to foster discussion and improve future content.

Outlines

00:00

🏓 Introduction to Service Techniques

The speaker introduces the video, mentioning it's part of a miniseries on service techniques. They emphasize the importance of universal principles for serving, such as touching the ball around shoulder height. Proper positioning of the ball is highlighted to ensure better control and camouflage during serves.

05:01

📏 Practical Serving Tips

The speaker advises against being influenced by viral videos showing impractical serves, like the ghost serve, which are not effective in matches. The importance of a serve's depth is discussed, emphasizing that a deeper second bounce makes the serve harder to return short.

10:02

🎯 Depth and Variation in Serves

Expanding on the previous video, the speaker talks about the importance of varying the depth and speed of serves to break the opponent's rhythm. They suggest practicing different serve placements and speeds to keep opponents guessing and to enhance overall game strategy.

🌀 Camouflaging Serves with Spin

The speaker explains how to camouflage serves by varying the point of contact on the racket. They describe different types of spins (backspin, topspin, and no spin) and how the point of contact affects the spin. The importance of disguising the serve to confuse the opponent is emphasized.

📐 Consistent Toss for Effective Serves

The speaker discusses the importance of a consistent toss to camouflage serves. They share a personal anecdote about practicing toss accuracy in tennis. A consistent toss allows for various serves (short, long, diagonal) without giving away the serve's intention to the opponent.

📹 Conclusion and Future Videos

The speaker concludes the video by thanking viewers and mentioning that another video in the series will be released in the future. They encourage viewers to leave comments with questions or suggestions for future videos, highlighting the value of feedback and discussion.

Keywords

💡Shoulder Height

In the context of serving, shoulder height refers to the height at which the ball should be touched during a serve, which is parallel to the shoulder. This helps in better control and camouflaging the serve. The script emphasizes this principle to ensure the serve is not too obvious to the receiver.

💡Camouflage

Camouflage in serving refers to making the serve less predictable to the opponent. The video highlights the importance of making the movements of different types of serves look similar to confuse the receiver. This includes maintaining a consistent toss and point of contact.

💡Reverse Pendulum Serve

A type of table tennis serve where the ball is struck in a way that creates reverse spin. The script explains the common mistake of touching the ball too far in front or behind the body, which can make the serve less effective.

💡Top Spin

A type of spin applied to the ball during a serve or rally where the top of the ball rotates forward. The script contrasts top spin with backspin and explains how the point of contact on the racket affects the spin, making it harder for the receiver to predict the serve.

💡Back Spin

A type of spin where the bottom of the ball rotates backward, often used to make the ball harder to return. The script describes how the point of contact on the racket influences backspin and how it can be used to deceive the opponent.

💡Depth of Serve

Refers to how far the ball lands on the opponent's side of the table. The script discusses the importance of varying the depth of serves to make them more difficult to return, comparing short serves that are easy to flick with deeper serves that are harder to reach.

💡Toss

The action of throwing the ball into the air before hitting it to serve. The script emphasizes the need for a consistent toss to better camouflage the serve and prevent the opponent from predicting the type of serve.

💡Consistency

In the context of the video, consistency refers to maintaining the same movements, toss, and point of contact in serves to make them less predictable. The script highlights practicing consistent tosses to improve overall serving technique.

💡Serve Practice

Practicing different types of serves to improve control, spin, and deception. The script refers to practicing with specific targets to improve consistency and camouflage in serves.

💡Viral Videos

Online videos that gain rapid popularity. The script warns against being misled by viral videos that show flashy but impractical serves, emphasizing the importance of practical techniques that are effective in matches.

Highlights

Introduction to universal principles of serving in table tennis, emphasizing general guidelines over specific techniques.

First principle: Touch the ball at shoulder height, parallel to the shoulder, to improve control and camouflage.

Common mistake: Touching the ball too much in front or behind the body during a serve.

Importance of consistent contact point: It helps to disguise the serve type from the receiver.

Second principle: Avoid being misled by viral videos of impractical serves like the 'ghost serve'.

Effective short serve: Aim for the second bounce near the end of the table to make it harder for the opponent to return.

Third principle: Vary the depth and speed of serves to disrupt the opponent's rhythm.

Example quiz: Identifying different serves based on bounce and rhythm without video cues.

Fourth principle: Camouflaging serves by changing the point of contact on the racket.

Detailed explanation of serve types: Reverse pendulum, regular sidespin, and scoop serves, with contact points for different spins.

Interactive segment: Quiz to guess the type of spin on different serves based on contact points.

Fifth principle: Consistent toss technique to disguise the type of serve.

Comparison to tennis training: Consistent toss practice using a marked spot to improve accuracy.

Practical advice: Keep the toss the same for all serve variations to prevent the opponent from anticipating the serve type.

Conclusion: Encouragement to apply these principles, with a promise of future videos on advanced serving techniques.

Transcripts

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service 101 service

2011

yeah

so guys welcome back again to the hall

in ANP kilip pong Hall of my sponsor and

today we're going to look at the second

Surf video service 201 today again as if

you watched last video you'll find out

that in this sort of video miniseries

we're not looking into a particular surf

or a technique of a particular surf but

we're more going to look at some sort of

universal or barely Universal principles

which should apply to a lot of service

at the same time and the first principle

that we're going to look into is to

touch the ball around shoulder height

shoulder height I don't mean the height

of your shoulder but I mean in like the

same length of your should of your

shoulder sort of like parallel to your

shoulder because what you'll see a lot

of people do is when they're trying out

or learning a new surf is they want to

serve a little bit in the table for I

mean like the perfect example for this

is reverse pendulum

Surf and what you'll do you'll see a lot

of people touch the ball way too much in

front of their body or which doesn't

occur so often touch the ball a little

bit too much behind themselves so an

example is

this see this surf okay came in the net

try to do one more

time it's way too obvious what

somebody's doing with this Surf and even

though it might give them a little bit

of control at first it's some something

which you should keep in mind and you

should try to maybe use this as a

stepping stone to get all the other

things of the surf right before you try

to go back and you switch again to

touching the surf at the right height

and this should be like in front of your

shoulder again as I said about

camouflaging your surf so this this is

one of the most important things to keep

in mind and that's the shoulder it's

something like an

indication it's not an entirely perfect

science but at this height at this Point

you'll be able to camouflage your sures

much more uh much better and yeah see

camouflaging that's what surf is all

about so if I'm going to serve a reverse

pendulum surf as I did

before and I'm going to touch it a bit

too too much in front of me and I'm

going to touch it too much below the

ball it's going to be too obvious for

the receiver if I'm going to serve with

Top Spin the difference in movement is

going to be too big well if I'm serving

once again with the correct point of

contact like a little bit in front of me

so this is where I would touch the ball

then this is a down spin

surf but this is a Top Spin

surf so there might be some small

differences I'm not paying perfect

attention to it I miss both serves okay

so it's quite cold in the hall I'm I'm

not too warmed up I'm giving countless

of countless of excuses but at least

you'll see that the movements are much

more similar to each other and yeah

that's what you should should keep in

mind so as a sort of guy line try to

touch the ball like in front of your

shoulder at shoulder

height okay second key point is not to

be fooled by viral videos on YouTube or

wherever you want you'll see a lot of

people trying to teach you like

something like a go surf or something

which is basically just a backspin surf

that stays over the table and rolls back

into the net and it might look cool at

first but it's not something which is

very useful in match because I mean it's

way too easy to receive short on this if

your surf comes too short so it's not

very practical there are some nuances to

it and I'll get into it in in next key

point but overall if you want to surf

short basically you want a second bounce

which comes near the end of the table

and because again that's much more

difficult to re to receive short on

because let's compare the two okay what

surf do you think would be easier to

receive short on this surf

where you touch the ball

there or where you touch the ball over

there a little bit deeper yeah see it's

going to be much more difficult on this

one and that that is just a basic sort

of physics thingy and yeah so these

viral sort sort of little videos about

the ghost sures about a serf that looks

like it has a lot of backspin might look

cool doesn't really work third key point

is from something similar from last

video from from service 101 see in that

video there was one key point that was

called try to know the difference

between a surf in the short forand in

the short forand in the short forand so

if that's not complicated enough I'm

just going to make it more complicated

by saying well you also need to know the

difference between a surf in a short for

end in the short for end and the short

for end twice twice because now before

we were talking about the placement of

the small differences in placement

towards the side more towards the

corners now we're going to talk about

the depth of the surf and as I said in

last key Point see if you serve very

short it's too easy to receive short on

but if you serve a little bit

longer sometimes for some people it's

going to be too easy to flick on so

you'll want to vary the the two of those

you want to switch things up a little

bit accordingly according what your

match situation is there's not really a

right or wrong in this case and as an

example I'll give you some sort of a

quiz and and I'll show you three surfes

and I want you guys to know or like look

at the difference in the bounce in the

depth or just the rhythm of how the ball

is

[Applause]

[Applause]

bouncing maybe you found out the

difference already but let's now do it

without any video

video

as you might have picked up some sures

are a little bit faster are a little bit

slower and these all help in Breaking

the rhythm of your opponent which is

also very important you don't want to be

too monotonous in your in your game even

with these small differences in Surf

which might have something to do with

the depth of your surf but not even the

depth sometimes it's also just about you

serving a little bit more a little bit

less into the table all these things can

help you VAR your surf even more and

bring your game to the next level yeah

key point four is also something which

we discussed in the previous video in

service 101 but because of some requests

and because of yeah just my conviction

itself I want to to explain it in a

little bit more of a detailed way where

we were talking about the way of

camouflaging your surf

by changing the point of contact see

normally as like a sort of ground rule

if you touch the ball on the bottom side

of your racket is going to be with down

spin the top side of your racket is

going to be with Top Spin and the back

side of your racket is going to be with

no spin so it depends on what serve

you're doing it depends on what serve

you're doing so I'm not going to go into

each and every one of those because that

would be just way too lengthy but we'll

just compare let's say uh a reverse

pendulum surf we'll start with the

reverse pendulum surf so because I'm

touching the ball in this

way this is going to be backspin

this part here top part is going to be

with Top Spin and maybe the end here is

going to be like a little kick surf a

little kick surf so the top of your wet

at the end is going to be a little bit

of a kick surf now regular side spin

surf bottom part back spin top part here

is going to be Top Spin and

the last bit of rubber on the uh on the

racket is going to be for no spin

the final surve maybe which we'll look

into is a sort of scoop Surf and this

surf can be done in a few different ways

because you can touch the ball let's say

with your wrecked head first with the

point of your wet first but you can also

do it a little bit more from the side so

again so you see how many sort of

differences there are so it's going to

be too difficult for me to explain and

for me to get into each and every one of

those it's going to be too long so

instead let's just to sort of like a

little quiz so I'm going to do some

serves and Luke will receive those and

right before he touch the ball I'm going

to freeze the frame and you're going to

have to guess which serve it was if it

was one with Top Spin with Back Spin or

with no Spin and comment below how many

of those you got

right

[Applause]

[Applause]

[Applause]

[Applause]

you

[Applause]

ATT

[Applause]

[Applause]

okay guys Fifth and last key point now

we're going to look at the toss so the

toss should be always almost the same or

it should always be the same actually

because that is also one way of

camouflaging your surf a little bit

better and I'm going to tell you a

little story to compare when I was young

I used to play tennis my dad would teach

me and my sister and when we were doing

surf practice he would always put like a

sort of a little circle a little pad on

the floor and we would toss the ball up

and we we would have to hit the ball

with h we would have to hit the pad with

the ball so that we could get consistent

toss again as a way as a way of

camouflaging because this is also

another level to camouflaging it's not

only your the same movement the same

aperture of your racket the same point

the different point of contact it's also

the toss so that is also another level

and so I'm going to demonstrate it from

that side over there because that helps

us just remove the camera

here because a lot of times when people

want to serve long they're going to toss

the ball a little bit more to the front

see if I'm serving short if I'm just a

regular guy I'm serving short probably

what's going to happen I'm going to toss

the ball throw the ball up a little bit

towards me which is not bad necessarily

just the way it

[Applause]

goes but if I am going to serve

long thank you if I'm going to serve

long then because I'm a little bit

scared

that I'm going to touch the ball too

much to the side that I won't be able to

serve down the line anymore well then

I'm going to throw it a little bit more

in front of me and you see this

difference in toss is something which a

receiver can pick up and that way he

will be he will be ready for the long

serve already so here this

toss it's different it's different and

it's too obvious this difference in toss

it's too obvious so try to keep this in

mind when you're serving down the line

when you're serving just an overall long

surf that you want to keep your toss the

same you want with the same toss you

want to have every opportunity

imaginable you want to be able to serve

short diagonal short down the line long

diagonal long down the line everything

with the same toss okay guys that was

the video again thank you very much for

watching I think I have one more video

in stock of sort of these miniseries

about the surf so surface 301 will come

out someday not in the too near future

um but as for now just thank you for

watching uh I hope you got something

from it which yeah this is my main goal

when making these videos and please

leave a comment down below if you have

any questions suggestions for other

videos if you want to have a sort of

note if you have anything to add on to

what I said then please just leave

something down below I always appreciate

the feedback that I get or the

discussion that can come from these

videos but for now thank you for

watching and hopefully I will see you

next time