Expert in a Year

hookumsnivy wrote: I think with the right environment, natural ability, fitness, desire and coach you can break 2000 within a year with just 365 hours of training by the coach.  However, you will need to have a lot of other help - LOTS of hours to practice and play matches, mentors that aren't considered your coach, etc.  Top 1% is an entirely different story though - you need be able to play against the top 1% to really understand the game play at that level.  And since only 1% of the players are at that level, you won't get many opportunities.

Edited by NextLevel - 02/15/2014 at 9:47am

if the subject won't be exposed to a variety of good players on a regular basis, praticising with the coach ain't going to do it, unless all his tournament opponents play a similar style / speed as the coach

NextLevel wrote: In fact, America makes it easier to get there than most countries because you can decide to play only Opens until you get to the required level, though the lack of wins may be demoralizing...

Hi everyone!

@Ben - Thanks for the insight.

I think he can do it.

The Nay Sayers remind me of a lot of people in TT that don't get the mastering of an activity. Don't get misled by players that plant negative seeds saying it took me X amount of long years to get this good. That's their story and doesn't have to be yours. ...

When I first saw the thread I thought it is possible.

In the past Black Belts in martial arts used to take donkeys years. But dedicated athletes working with the correct Master can focus your hard work and take the direct route, without wasting most of your time with instructors deciding if you are dedicated or not, whilst you get disinterested with the drawn out (not) learning process.

My question to Ben is what style of player are you developing?

Attacker, defender, two wing looper, all rounder?

Dual inverted rubbers, long pimples backhand etc?

What blade and rubber combination is he playing with?

Do you expect him to stick with the same set-up or change as he progresses.?


Thanks! ...

no matter where he will be in a year he'll be much higher than most of us for sure if he stays on course and sticks to the plan.
it is a nice adventure and I hope we can see monthly videos of his training and matches (short form maybe, jkc & son style?).

No, LP will be his doom.

even reaching 2000 in a span of a year by just practicing 1 hr a day is close to impossible. as what other people have already stated, you cannot teach gameplay tactics  in that span of time. maybe reaching 2000 can be achieved by playing and training at least 4 hrs a day but just by an hr no! and there also goes the issue of service receives, sure you can train that but how bout in a non-training environment? i t takes a lot of experience to master receiving serves and training with is only half of the deal.

I have seen kids through the years, progress at a pretty quick rate but even they don't progress as fast as what this challenge is proposing.  He is also not a kid and his learning curve is going to be a lot slower.  I honestly don't see him reaching this goal or even getting close to it.

collins.latag wrote: Rating is all about consistency and not about looking good. While being an expert means one is very consistent.

Expert IMO is about looking good, playing orthodox and knowing all about the game. Most of the coaches are experts without being in the top 1% players.

vvk1 wrote: APW46 wrote: Ping Coach wrote: Regarding the top 1% thing I contacted the ETTA and asked how many registered players there were this season and they answered 25,000.  The majority of these players will be local league players (somewhere between a basement player and a tournament player). They are serious enough to play pretty much every week for a team, have joined the ETTA and have many years of matches experience but they don't general travel around to tournaments on the weekends etc. There are currently 628 players on the senior men's list because you only get a ranking if you have played one of these ranking tournaments in the past 5 months.  Top 250 would make Sam "roughly" in the top 1% of active competing players in England. It's not exact but you get the idea.  Well, sorry to be picky, but you are using two different sets of figures to come up with your 1%. If 24,372 players are not on the senior men's ranking list, you can't include them in your percentage calculation, as you know, any player can get a ranking by entering an event included in the ratings scheme regardless of their standard of play. Likewise, players of a very high level can appear to be very low. Our number one junior is 13 on the current senior list, but our number one cadet, who appears at no9 on the junior list is 626 on the men's list because he has not played enough senior events. Our system is difficult to understand for many around the globe, but I honestly think you will bring English TT down if you make it appear that a player can go from basement to the top 1% in a single year. IMHO, the quirks of ETTA's ranking system are not Sam's fault, so I don't see how coaching a player to reach ETTA top 250 in the course of one year can "bring English TT down". His goal is to attempt to produce a player that will be ranked inside 250 of all "active competing players in England".  I play in 3 different local leagues in the south-east, and the top division of each has nationally ranked players, both seniors and juniors, including players inside top 250. Such players are universally at the top of the division they play in, and while they sometimes lose a game to a nationally unranked player, they still are within or very close of being in top 1% of the league's players. So, IMHO, Sam's guesstimate that being ranked in ETTA's top 250 is more or less equivalent to being top 1% of all league players is quite plausible.

Ben,

vvk1 wrote: APW46 wrote: vvk1 wrote: APW46 wrote: Ping Coach wrote: Regarding the top 1% thing I contacted the ETTA and asked how many registered players there were this season and they answered 25,000.  The majority of these players will be local league players (somewhere between a basement player and a tournament player). They are serious enough to play pretty much every week for a team, have joined the ETTA and have many years of matches experience but they don't general travel around to tournaments on the weekends etc. There are currently 628 players on the senior men's list because you only get a ranking if you have played one of these ranking tournaments in the past 5 months.  Top 250 would make Sam "roughly" in the top 1% of active competing players in England. It's not exact but you get the idea.  Well, sorry to be picky, but you are using two different sets of figures to come up with your 1%. If 24,372 players are not on the senior men's ranking list, you can't include them in your percentage calculation, as you know, any player can get a ranking by entering an event included in the ratings scheme regardless of their standard of play. Likewise, players of a very high level can appear to be very low. Our number one junior is 13 on the current senior list, but our number one cadet, who appears at no9 on the junior list is 626 on the men's list because he has not played enough senior events. Our system is difficult to understand for many around the globe, but I honestly think you will bring English TT down if you make it appear that a player can go from basement to the top 1% in a single year. IMHO, the quirks of ETTA's ranking system are not Sam's fault, so I don't see how coaching a player to reach ETTA top 250 in the course of one year can "bring English TT down". His goal is to attempt to produce a player that will be ranked inside 250 of all "active competing players in England".  I play in 3 different local leagues in the south-east, and the top division of each has nationally ranked players, both seniors and juniors, including players inside top 250. Such players are universally at the top of the division they play in, and while they sometimes lose a game to a nationally unranked player, they still are within or very close of being in top 1% of the league's players. So, IMHO, Sam's guesstimate that being ranked in ETTA's top 250 is more or less equivalent to being top 1% of all league players is quite plausible.  How can you believe that ! that is just the kind of thinking that makes players obsessed with 'rankings' believe they are something they are not. It assumes that everyone currently ranked is superior in standard to anyone who is not, this means that the 628 seniors who are on the current ranking list are in the top 2.5% of all active English players. I can pick plenty of names out of that lot that are not even in the top division of their local league, let alone near the top of the averages. The Rankings get more accurate higher up, Between 200 and 300 I have just counted 33 players I have played against in competition, and I can tell you its not possible to attain what is required to join their ranks in one year from basic basement level, in fact its a bit of an insult to them to believe its possible.  APW46, you're putting words in my mouth that I did not say. I did not claim that all 628 ranked seniors are in the top 2.5 percent. Nor did I (nor Ben for that matter) made the assumption that all ranked players are superior to all unranked ones. All I said was that played ranked inside top 250 tend to be among the best of all players in their local leagues, hence being inside top 250 is actually a good indicator of a players level. Perhaps you play in a league where players ranked 200-250 are not good enough to be at the top of their local league division, but all this means is that your league is an exception, not a rule.

Ping Coach wrote: Hi everyone! It's great to hear your opinions and of course they are going to differ depending on your beliefs regarding "talent" and table tennis. The ranking list isn't perfect (I think we would all agree on that wherever we are and whatever system we use) it's just an indicator of performance level. To simplify we can forget the top 1% thing if that is unhelpful and just agree on this... 1. Every player currently ranked in the top 250 in England is a pretty decent level player. 2. You can't just jump into the top 250. You'll have to reach a pretty high level to get a ranking in there. 3. To go from nothing to top 250 would be a pretty impressive (read: potentially impossible) achievement. 4. If Sam does make it, albeit with an "out of the ordinary" amount of training, coaching and practice in a 12 month period, then perhaps with the right focus and determination it's possible to achieve more than we think. 5. If Sam doesn't make it, then clearly "more" is needed. More hours of training. More quality. More "talent". More coaching expertise. Or perhaps it's just not possible for Sam. I guess we'll never know.

That sounds far better to be, I don't think he can do it, the time limit is too tight IMHO, but hats off for trying, I am really interested in this, especially as you post regular clips.

Hi everyone, it is interesting to hear everybody's opinions on whether it is possible. The fact so many don't believe it is means there is nothing to lose... if it works we have accomplished something special and shown that EFFECTIVE training can give big results compared to the standard way most people tend to train.