1. Their feet hardly leave the floor.  When I see video of myself I am clearly lifting my feet off the ground.   I am trying not to jump but still my feet seem to be much higher off the ground.

2. Their feet seem to move almost simultaneously.  My trailing foot moves very early and it seems that often the leading foot does not even start moving until the trailing foot almost lands at its final location.

I know both of these differences really slow my movement down.  Despite my best efforts I can not seem to figure out a way to get closer to the kind of footwork I see good players doing.

Are there any specific techniques I might need to use or is there anything I might be doing that I should stop doing in order to get my footwork more in line with that of better players.

Note: I am referring to footwork done closer to the table for small to medium movements and not to cross-over type moves nor footwork at mid-distance from the table.

Mark

Well that should actually be a pretty quick fix since I get exhausted after about 6 balls :)

Mark

I really do think it is more than a strength or endurance issue.  I can not make even a single move without my feet behaving a whole lot differently than what happens with good players.  If for example I was not swinging the racket correctly for a loop, you probably would not tell me to go to the weight room and improve my arm strength.  You most likely would tell me something about changing how my feet are positioned or how I am taking the racket back in the backswing.

It might be related to something that I am doing in the basic stance like having feet too narrow or not having enough bend in the knees.  Maybe there is actually some initiation move that I am not making.  Once coach mentioned something about "pulling" with the leading leg.  On some videos of the pro players it appears that the hips and upper body kind of slide in the direction of movement just before the feet start moving.  I have tried doing that and it did seem to help, but I am not sure if that is really good or bad technique since it is kind of a form of "leaning" toward the ball.  Maybe this is not even what I am actually seeing on the video.

Anyway if anyone has ever got a tip or a technical detail or making those shorter, both feet at same time, type movements please let me know.

Mark

My stance is about 3ft wide (about 2xshoulder width) most of the time although it does sometimes get a little narrower.

Unless I am going for a kill my loop starts more with the hips without a pushoff.  Sometimes it just starts with the arm.

I can loop without moving my feet off the ground  and I think I do that most of the time.

The problem with the feet leaving the ground was not really when following through.  I was talking about being in the ready position, seeing the ball going wide enough that I need to move, and then trying to move there before swinging.  When I watch the Chinese players they seem to never let their feet get off the floor that much.  When I try to move both feet come off the ground several inches and the trailing foot always seems to have to get to its destination before I can get the leading foot to start moving.  Both those things eat up time before I can get set at my new position.  That is the move I am trying to speed up.

Mark

Background: My coach also coaches some of the top English juniors (#2 U13, #11 Cadet, #3 Junior, #7 U21. #14 Senior).  His number one focus is footwork.

General guidance:

- Wider stance is not necessarily better.  To move quickly you must push hard with the inside leg (so left if you're going right), and the furher apart your legs are, the harder it is to get that propulsion.

- Movement should be focussed on gliding, not stepping or jumping.  The feet need leave the floor on my a few millimetres, only sufficient to reduce friction

- Consciously move after every shot, even if it's only a fractional movement.  It much harder to move from stationary.  If you're already moving it's easier.  Be moving all the time.

- Drill multiball as often as possible.  5 ball is great, Wide to Fh, between fh and mid table, mid table, between mid table and bh and wide to bh.  Play FH to all these shots.  Quickly.  Occasionally mix up.  Vary length and spin and pace so you have to move in and out as well as sideways (actually in an arc to keep correct position)

- For a really intense workout, put two tables together, and do a similar exercise, but now you have twice as far to travel

- Avoid training a shot in one position.  This is one of the biggest mistakes made - people groove their FH topspin with their feet planted like trees in one place.  Rarely is a training partner able to provide that degree of accuracy anyway, so form tends to be messed up my people leaning and stretching, thus not playing the same shot every time.  Robot are more predictable, but you still need to keep moving.  Much better to program the robot to oscillate.  Some robots have excellent random programmes.  The key is that TT is a game about movement.  Learn the mechanics of the shot, so you always play the same shot, but learn also to move in space and time so you can play that shot optimally.  This demands movement.

- Do a lot of skipping (jumping rope).  All the above-mentioned juniors skip insanely well.  This is brilliant for strength, stamina, footspeed, breathcontrol.  Skip where you switch foot every time, and move sideways and backwards.

- Do some more skipping.

- Incorporate other footwork drills without a bat.  Move as fast as possible from left end of the long side of the table, touch with right hand, move quickly to right side, touch with left hand.  See how many you can do in 60 secs.

- Do short shuttle runs, up to the length of about 2-3 tables (no longer).

- Always spend time at training doing a full warmup before picking up the bat - get your muscles warm and relaxed and your heart beat up

Hope some of this helps!

Is your whole foot down on the floor?  When I see good players doing multiball they pivot on the balls of their feet so both heels turn in the direction they are moving, and they sort of glide across the floor that way.  Both feet move at the same time.  I can try to find a video if you don't know what I mean.

The main thing is that both feet should move on just about every shot.  That's makes it hard for people with general knee/weight issues.  But if you commit to that in practice, your footwork tends to improve even without formal training to a decent degree.

The other two problems are harder: one is being able to play at a distance from the table where the right first motion is not to extend your racket hand, but to move towards the ball with your racket hand close to your body.  The other is being able to keep your balance in the middle of your body so you can stably move in either direction.  Those are beyond me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhbkp27Dldo" rel="nofollow - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhbkp27Dldo

This guy has his weight forward almost all the time.  He bounces on the balls of his feet and only sets his heels down to rebalance for a second.  It's impossible to move like this if you stand flat-footed with your weight back.

Those 2 videos show exactly what I am unable to do.

In my case I just can not seem to get both feet to move that simultaneously.  In fact despite my best efforts I always seem to move one foot almost to its new position (having the feet come pretty close to each other) and then the other foot moves to its new position.  Effectively this takes almost twice as long to get to the new position as it would if both feet moved together.  Also I seem to be hopping over to the new position instead of that slide or glide motion you see in the videos you posted.

I have a very clear picture of what I want to do.  I go practice and think I am pretty close to doing it.  Then I look at the video and what I see myself doing is not anywhere close to what I thought I was doing.

That is why I was hoping there was some little trick or technique that I was not using that would allow me to do what I was envisioning that I was doing.

Mark

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgvhAWWsoJk

She's very light on her feet, *well balanced* and the loop is plenty strong. The key is to hold that balance during the drill. If you watch it in slow-mo, you can clearly see how it's done. Everyone can loop one or maybe three hard but end up overbalanced. Therefore it becomes tough/impossible to recover for the next ball. In other words, the weight transfer has to be done but not overdone. 

Even without the ball, I find it impossible to copy what's she's doing in real-time. It's really not so easy. Try it. You have to be very economical with movement to keep it going.

Wow, what a match! 

For the really small steps... hopsteps... do you jump off the ground with both feet or with just one quickly followed by the other?

This makes a huge difference to me... it seems to take me 10 times as much effort to jump off with both feet. But it seems like the pros jump with both feet together.

Like in this video:

at around 1:17.

I'm unable to jump off with both feet smoothly the way he does. It looks almost effortless. Plus his upper body barely moves during the jump... my upper body moves a lot more.

Is this just a matter of developing leg strength?

Very nice footwork. I think what puzzles me is... how does one jump like that wiithout having to crouch the body at all... I mean there's barely a vertical motion to the jump... it's almost side to side gliding. I find it impossible to get off the ground without more vertical motion.

 

Thanks. So is his jump thrust coming completely from his feet? (ie pushing off the balls of his feet?) his legs barely bend during the jump.

i think so. 

here is another good video

She was at my house again last month. There is a _lot_ to get. Her footwork/stroke is the smooth, slick integration of a lot of different things.

1. Notice the waist and foot twist on each ball. This to me is harder, costs more energy than the side skipping. This plus the backwards/forwards weight shifts gives the ball real quality. 

2. As others have pointed out also, one should barely bounce upwards. Energy is most profitably spent going side to side. She said the reduction in vertical bounce will come given enough balls and time, since you must maximize the efficiency of the forces deployed in order to survive a bucket of balls. (I bounce up and down too much.)

3. When you land, you should visualize anchoring your driving foot to the floor before twisting. Then drive everything off that.

4. When you land, there is a subtle weight shift backwards (not just to the right) onto the anchor foot. When you do the foot twist, there is a weight shift forwards to the other foot. Avoiding the appearance of rocking will also come with enough balls and time.

So there is weight shift laterally (bounce); there is weight shift back and forth; there is the foot twist. And I haven't even detailed the arm close, the ball contact point, or the read of the incoming ball. When everything clicks, it's beautiful, naturally effortless yet hard as hell. I want it. But it's a longterm project; especially if you've been doing it "naturally" wrong for years and have to unlearn like me. That's the fun.