Bounce with the Ball / Split-Step

[turbozed]

I recently watched the video below featuring Coach Meng on the WRM Channel about a preparatory bounce step being the foundation of higher level footwork.

This led me down to further research about the topic where I came across an eye-opening article (for me at least) entitled "Bounce with the Ball" here: Bounce with the Ball by Tom Veach

Here is a brief snippet of the article that gets to the meat of the topic, but the whole article is well written and informative:

In "bounce with the ball", there are two two-footed hops per ball contact: Attack and Recover, where the interesting one is Recover.
Because after you touch the ball in a rally, how many times does the ball bounce before you touch it again?

Not one: it has to bounce on the other side of the table, and then back on your side. People have to think about it. Two. Yes, two. (Three if you are serving.)

This is typical: I make a beautiful swing and hit a great stroke, and then I spend my precious recovery-and-preparation time watching my beautifully struck ball flying away, celebrating and cheering for it to hit the table, smiling stupidly with the thought of what a great shot it was and how my opponent will surely miss it. Then I reinforce my own insecurity when I discover it coming back to me. Oh no! Then I rush late to return the ball which I haven't planned to recieve. Result: bad, rushed, missed.

Instead I should stop paying attention to what I can no longer influence, and pay extra attention to getting ready for the next: Recover!

So by the time my ball hits the other side of the table (hopefully the shortest part of the cycle, if I am on offense), I should have touched down, compressed into a bounce, and be bouncing back to a recovered, balanced, side-uncommitted position and posture. I should HURRY to recover. I should CONCENTRATE on recovering. Then I'll have TIME to watch my opponent's intention and plan my third ball.

As you may imagine, this seems awfully complex, putting a lot together. But Yazel is right, "Bounce with the ball" simplifies and coordinates everything.

6 months into starting table tennis, I didn't really understand why my feet always look so planted and my mobility is so poor. Concentrating on "staying low" somewhat helps. And I've been aware of the split-step concept for a while, especially after serving. But I never realized why the pros and higher level players look so nimble and teleporting easily to the ball. This is especially noticeable when watching women's pros bounce around playing so close to the table.

Right now I feel like implementing this concept is the first step (no pun intended) to developing good footwork (and hopefully advanced level footwork in the distant future). I come from a martial arts background where I developed a firm belief that everything starts 'from the ground up' through footwork, and this seems to be the case in almost all athletic endeavors. Having proper footwork means being in position and prepared for swinging a racket of throwing a punch. So if these bounce steps are the foundation for table tennis footwork, it seems like ths is something I need to master as soon as possible.

But I wanted to ask the high level players and coaches here what they think about this concept first.

Is Tom Veach correct that many if not most high level pros are implementing a recovery bounce and a preparatory bounce timed with the ball bounce whenever possible?

Is this something beginners should be taught and drill as soon as possible? Or is it something I should not worry about too much right now and will come organically over time?

How much focus should I spend on this footwork during practice? Should I be bouncing only on movement drills (2 points, Falkenberg, etc.) or should I do a small bounce for every single racket action?

If you've gotten to the end of this post and read and watched the linked content, thank you and I look forward to hearing your thoughts!

 

[blahness]

I've been tinkering with footwork and weight transfer a lot these days. Like what you said, rhythm and timing of the footwork is extremely important. The split step is taught in badminton and tennis all the time but is not really talked about much in English TT for some unknown reason.

From my experiments and observations, you get max quality in your shots when your weight transfer occurs at precisely the exact time when you hit the ball - not later or earlier. So for eg. the timing when you step on your left foot for the FH loop, right foot for the BH loop and all short ball receives. This is also what I observed watching the pros play. Hence there's a lot of "small steps" to calibrate your timing with the incoming ball. Also explains why rhythm breaking is so crucial - because it complicates this timing significantly.

For eg during serve receive you can see actually a lot of shuffling of weight between the left and right foot in players. It's an incredibly small movement but it's present. Truls Moregardh probably does it the most visibly. So if the ball is to the right you can lean quickly to your right to quick start the footwork movement to find the ideal position of your right foot. Usually it's 3 steps - right, left, right to get to the position - same with short balls. If the ball is to your left then you lean towards the left to kick start the FH pivot or do another 3 steps to find the ideal positioning for the BH.

After a FH/BH stroke your weight will be on one foot and you need to shift your centre of gravity back to the middle as well as bring your elbow back to neutral. Otherwise you won't be able to account for all the possibilities of your opponent's return. This recovery is also initiated by the foot bouncing back and the body pulling back, not the arm. Then there's another small "split step" to prepare the centre of gravity for the next shot.

 

[blahness]

I am also interested to hear someone analyse this short push footwork especially the recovery that Ma Long is using here.

 

[turbozed]

Usually it's 3 steps - right, left, right to get to the position - same with short balls. If the ball is to your left then you lean towards the left to kick start the FH pivot or do another 3 steps to find the ideal positioning for the BH.

I've been doing a small step to my left for the step-around for a few months now after watching this video:

Just the small weight transfer to the left made the whole movement much faster and fluid.

After a FH/BH stroke your weight will be on one foot and you need to shift your centre of gravity back to the middle as well as bring your elbow back to neutral. Otherwise you won't be able to account for all the possibilities of your opponent's return. This recovery is also initiated by the foot bouncing back and the body pulling back, not the arm. Then there's another small "split step" to prepare the centre of gravity for the next shot.

I just came back from a training session where I focused on incorporating the recovery bounce step and I can verify that it greatly helps in getting to the next shot. This is especially the case with FH/BH transitions. Without the recovery bounce step, transitioning between FH and BH resulted in errors caused by the previous stroke negatively impacting the next. Adding in the recovery step is like a refresh button that wipes out the imbalance from the previous stroke and lets you start your next stroke balanced again.

I also found out that, unless you have superhuman movement, 'bouncing with the ball' is mostly focusing on the recovery bounce as soon as possible after your stroke. The next 'bounce' is just the beginning of your next stroke, and ideally your knees are bending at the same time as the ball coming back to your side of the table so that the stored energy is used in your next stroke.

Looking back at replay video, when I'm properly bouncing with the ball, I look much more nimble with footwork that (very poorly) resembles footwork you'd see at higher level play. I feel like this 'bouncing with the ball' will be an incredible cue to incorporate into my training.

 

[blahness]

I've been doing a small step to my left for the step-around for a few months now after watching this video:

Just the small weight transfer to the left made the whole movement much faster and fluid.

I just came back from a training session where I focused on incorporating the recovery bounce step and I can verify that it greatly helps in getting to the next shot. This is especially the case with FH/BH transitions. Without the recovery bounce step, transitioning between FH and BH resulted in errors caused by the previous stroke negatively impacting the next. Adding in the recovery step is like a refresh button that wipes out the imbalance from the previous stroke and lets you start your next stroke balanced again.

I also found out that, unless you have superhuman movement, 'bouncing with the ball' is mostly focusing on the recovery bounce as soon as possible after your stroke. The next 'bounce' is just the beginning of your next stroke, and ideally your knees are bending at the same time as the ball coming back to your side of the table so that the stored energy is used in your next stroke.

Looking back at replay video, when I'm properly bouncing with the ball, I look much more nimble with footwork that (very poorly) resembles footwork you'd see at higher level play. I feel like this 'bouncing with the ball' will be an incredible cue to incorporate into my training.

Yep that recovery bounce helped me a lot too. Imo, the recovery after a short serve receive is a lot more complex and I don't fully understand it yet. Because you're already in a lunge position with the weight on the front foot (right), it feels a lot harder to come back. Some coaches online say that you're supposed to bounce off that front foot and get back, some others like PechPong say you should bounce back with both feet, and some videos I saw pros just kinda slide the right foot swiftly back (like what Ma Long did there, for each short push his right foot takes 3 steps at 3 distances, I have no idea how to replicate it at such a speed).

There's also probably differences whether the receive is a short push or a long receive, and if it's long whether it's an attacking topspin receive or a underspin type receive.

 

[turbozed]

Yep that recovery bounce helped me a lot too. Imo, the recovery after a short serve receive is a lot more complex and I don't fully understand it yet. Because you're already in a lunge position with the weight on the front foot (right), it feels a lot harder to come back. Some coaches online say that you're supposed to bounce off that front foot and get back, some others like PechPong say you should bounce back with both feet, and some videos I saw pros just kinda slide the right foot swiftly back (like what Ma Long did there, for each short push his right foot takes 3 steps at 3 distances, I have no idea how to replicate it at such a speed).

There's also probably differences whether the receive is a short push or a long receive, and if it's long whether it's an attacking topspin receive or a underspin type receive.

Here's another slowmo video of Ma Long pushing and recovering from the position. You can see him do it starting at 2:08 and 6:20:

Looks like there are two steps with his right foot from the lunge position. His initial recovery step is halfway towards the split step. And the next step he fully goes back to his ready position and it coincides with when he makes his stroke. I'm guessing because he's so close to the table, the second step (or bounce) can't be in preparation for the stroke but concurrent with it, due to being so much closer to the table.

 

[blahness]

Here's another slowmo video of Ma Long pushing and recovering from the position. You can see him do it starting at 2:08 and 6:20:

Looks like there are two steps with his right foot from the lunge position. His initial recovery step is halfway towards the split step. And the next step he fully goes back to his ready position and it coincides with when he makes his stroke. I'm guessing because he's so close to the table, the second step (or bounce) can't be in preparation for the stroke but concurrent with it, due to being so much closer to the table.

You're right, there is an intermediate step here in the video you shown too.

I'm wondering why is there an intermediate step (halfway between full lunge and final split step), isn't it just easier to go straight to the split step?

I don't do the intermediate step personally and am wondering if I should add it in too if it's of value to my game.

 

[turbozed]

You're right, there is an intermediate step here in the video you shown too.

I'm wondering why is there an intermediate step (halfway between full lunge and final split step), isn't it just easier to go straight to the split step?

I don't do the intermediate step personally and am wondering if I should add it in too if it's of value to my game.

I'm just guessing here but after lunging forward for a push, as you said it requires a lot of effort to get into the split step position as it requires a big jump backwards.

This big jump backwards plants you more in place and limits mobility in case your opponent decides to put the ball wide to the right hand side. Jumping further away from table makes it harder to get to deep FH side distance wise as well.

With the intermediate step, you're still light on your toes and can more easily move to the FH side. If it goes to the BH side you can choose to go back fully to the split step while doing your stroke, like ML is doing in the videos.

We can confirm this if we find some ML footage of him taking the half step and then seeing how he moves to a wide FH from that position. Either way, ML has determined there's an advantage to taking the half step since he's drilling that half step in the video you linked. The key question is whether we should imitate this or if this is only going to benefit players as good as ML.

 

[Wrighty67]

I recently watched the video below featuring Coach Meng on the WRM Channel about a preparatory bounce step being the foundation of higher level footwork.

This led me down to further research about the topic where I came across an eye-opening article (for me at least) entitled "Bounce with the Ball" here: Bounce with the Ball by Tom Veach

Here is a brief snippet of the article that gets to the meat of the topic, but the whole article is well written and informative:


6 months into starting table tennis, I didn't really understand why my feet always look so planted and my mobility is so poor. Concentrating on "staying low" somewhat helps. And I've been aware of the split-step concept for a while, especially after serving. But I never realized why the pros and higher level players look so nimble and teleporting easily to the ball. This is especially noticeable when watching women's pros bounce around playing so close to the table.

Right now I feel like implementing this concept is the first step (no pun intended) to developing good footwork (and hopefully advanced level footwork in the distant future). I come from a martial arts background where I developed a firm belief that everything starts 'from the ground up' through footwork, and this seems to be the case in almost all athletic endeavors. Having proper footwork means being in position and prepared for swinging a racket of throwing a punch. So if these bounce steps are the foundation for table tennis footwork, it seems like ths is something I need to master as soon as possible.

But I wanted to ask the high level players and coaches here what they think about this concept first.

Is Tom Veach correct that many if not most high level pros are implementing a recovery bounce and a preparatory bounce timed with the ball bounce whenever possible?

Is this something beginners should be taught and drill as soon as possible? Or is it something I should not worry about too much right now and will come organically over time?

How much focus should I spend on this footwork during practice? Should I be bouncing only on movement drills (2 points, Falkenberg, etc.) or should I do a small bounce for every single racket action?

If you've gotten to the end of this post and read and watched the linked content, thank you and I look forward to hearing your thoughts!

Very interesting thread for me - footwork is by far my biggest impediment to playing well, and I also find myself lead footed and caught out by a ball coming back to me.

I have been trying to find an unlock into better footwork, as opposed to just trying to focus harder on it, which doesn't seem to work in matches - this could be it, so thanks.

 

[turbozed]

Very interesting thread for me - footwork is by far my biggest impediment to playing well, and I also find myself lead footed and caught out by a ball coming back to me.

I have been trying to find an unlock into better footwork, as opposed to just trying to focus harder on it, which doesn't seem to work in matches - this could be it, so thanks.

I've been watching pros play in slow mo Youtube videos all day after discovering this concept. Once you start looking for the bounces, you'll start seeing them everywhere.

Let me know how it feels on your end after you've tried incorporating this into your footwork. I can tell you that I got significantly more tired doing it. I'm sure there will be an adjustment period where I'll get more energy efficient. But, at this rate, I'm pretty sure I'll need to increase my endurance if I want to move like this for an extended period of time.

 

[Wrighty67]

I've been watching pros play in slow mo Youtube videos all day after discovering this concept. Once you start looking for the bounces, you'll start seeing them everywhere.

Let me know how it feels on your end after you've tried incorporating this into your footwork. I can tell you that I got significantly more tired doing it. I'm sure there will be an adjustment period where I'll get more energy efficient. But, at this rate, I'm pretty sure I'll need to increase my endurance if I want to move like this for an extended period of time.

Yeah, I have watched a few now to see it - very interesting. It seems a little hard to conceptualise and co-ordinate in terms of timing the recovery bounce. Do you hit the shot in the slight upwards from the first bounce and then immediately drop into the recovery bounce before jumping up and into position?

 

[blahness]

I'm just guessing here but after lunging forward for a push, as you said it requires a lot of effort to get into the split step position as it requires a big jump backwards.

This big jump backwards plants you more in place and limits mobility in case your opponent decides to put the ball wide to the right hand side. Jumping further away from table makes it harder to get to deep FH side distance wise as well.

With the intermediate step, you're still light on your toes and can more easily move to the FH side. If it goes to the BH side you can choose to go back fully to the split step while doing your stroke, like ML is doing in the videos.

We can confirm this if we find some ML footage of him taking the half step and then seeing how he moves to a wide FH from that position. Either way, ML has determined there's an advantage to taking the half step since he's drilling that half step in the video you linked. The key question is whether we should imitate this or if this is only going to benefit players as good as ML.

I watched a lot more ML matches and this half step is always present after he pushes a short ball. I'm convinced of your explanation and will try to incorporate this. It does make sense because I also incorporate this intermediate step when stepping in (which makes it easy and smooth) rather than lunging in in 1 step, so it makes sense that going back would be similar.

 

[turbozed]

Yeah, I have watched a few now to see it - very interesting. It seems a little hard to conceptualise and co-ordinate in terms of timing the recovery bounce. Do you hit the shot in the slight upwards from the first bounce and then immediately drop into the recovery bounce before jumping up and into position?

For the recovery bounce step, I'm going with the article explanation that it should be done as soon as possible after finishing your stroke. Bouncing with the ball on the recovery step seems like it's just a cue to not pause and gawk at your ball after contact.

It seems a bit more important to get the attack bounce timed correctly since it will more directly affect the quality and power of the shot.

 

[blahness]

I'm just guessing here but after lunging forward for a push, as you said it requires a lot of effort to get into the split step position as it requires a big jump backwards.

This big jump backwards plants you more in place and limits mobility in case your opponent decides to put the ball wide to the right hand side. Jumping further away from table makes it harder to get to deep FH side distance wise as well.

With the intermediate step, you're still light on your toes and can more easily move to the FH side. If it goes to the BH side you can choose to go back fully to the split step while doing your stroke, like ML is doing in the videos.

We can confirm this if we find some ML footage of him taking the half step and then seeing how he moves to a wide FH from that position. Either way, ML has determined there's an advantage to taking the half step since he's drilling that half step in the video you linked. The key question is whether we should imitate this or if this is only going to benefit players as good as ML.

I did some shadow training on this, and I found that having that intermediate step is not slower than doing what I did previously (1 full step back). Like what you mentioned i feel like my steps are a lot lighter when I reach the split step from the intermediate step because it's less drastic of a weight shift - this allows me to switch directions more rapidly depending on the incoming ball. Also it's less tiring this way, because the intermediate step basically frees you from the tiring lunge position and is a form of relaxation.

 

[turbozed]

I did some shadow training on this, and I found that having that intermediate step is not slower than doing what I did previously (1 full step back). Like what you mentioned i feel like my steps are a lot lighter when I reach the split step from the intermediate step because it's less drastic of a weight shift - this allows me to switch directions more rapidly depending on the incoming ball. Also it's less tiring this way, because the intermediate step basically frees you from the tiring lunge position and is a form of relaxation.

This is great. I'm glad this thread is producing something people can use. I'm going to start doing the half split step on my pushing exercises too. I usually do pushing right after a movement drill like Falkenberg so I'm tired and way too lazy to do a full lunge forward and full split step backwards for each push. The half step seems like a good compromise to keep the feet moving without making pushing practice a jumping drill.

 

[Wrighty67]

I tried to implement bounce steps into my practice on Monday and will again tonight - I found it very challenging to both remember and to co-ordinate.

Even when visualising it it's not easy but I am working on first bounce (down) as ball lands my side of table, and second bounce down as ball lands there side of the table (which I hope is correct)

I definitely found a benefit when I managed to bounce back into neutral.

 

[turbozed]

I tried to implement bounce steps into my practice on Monday and will again tonight - I found it very challenging to both remember and to co-ordinate.

Even when visualising it it's not easy but I am working on first bounce (down) as ball lands my side of table, and second bounce down as ball lands there side of the table (which I hope is correct)

I definitely found a benefit when I managed to bounce back into neutral.

I also found it too difficult to implement both phases comfortably the first training session. I've decided to just focus on just doing the recovery step for now. My reasoning is that the recovery step helps to positively increase balance and mobility for the next stroke even without the preparation bounce.

Might take quite a while for the recovery step to become acceptable, but when I'm satisfied that I'm doing it for enough of my strokes, I'll switch over to focusing on the attack/preparation bounce. In between now and whenever that is, I'll continue to do the drill posted in the article.

If you find it too difficult to do both in practice, I posted articles in a different thread about skill acquisition being accelerated when focusing on one aspect per training session. So maybe for now it might be a good idea to focus on one step at a time.

Interleaving practice is also a proven method of accelerating learning, so it might even be better to do a movement drill where you do, for example, 5 minutes just focusing on the recovery bounce, and the next 5 on the preparation bounce, and go back and forth like that.

 

[Wrighty67]

I also found it too difficult to implement both phases comfortably the first training session. I've decided to just focus on just doing the recovery step for now. My reasoning is that the recovery step helps to positively increase balance and mobility for the next stroke even without the preparation bounce.

Might take quite a while for the recovery step to become acceptable, but when I'm satisfied that I'm doing it for enough of my strokes, I'll switch over to focusing on the attack/preparation bounce. In between now and whenever that is, I'll continue to do the drill posted in the article.

If you find it too difficult to do both in practice, I posted articles in a different thread about skill acquisition being accelerated when focusing on one aspect per training session. So maybe for now it might be a good idea to focus on one step at a time.

Interleaving practice is also a proven method of accelerating learning, so it might even be better to do a movement drill where you do, for example, 5 minutes just focusing on the recovery bounce, and the next 5 on the preparation bounce, and go back and forth like that.

Good idea - I will focus on recovery bounce tonight. Thx!

 

[NextLevel]

Really wish BRS would chime in as this is one of his favorite topics, though probably not in the way you have discussed it.

I tend to stay away from questions about athletic footwork because my bad knees make it a nightmare for me for me to train aggressively. but I would say that the more you train both standard and random footwork, even if at a snail pace, the more you get in tune with what the balance and timing requirements for playing quality shots are. A lot of this will happen almost automatically as long as you are testing solutions to move into and out of position to make certain shots possible - you don't have to do them extremely fast to begin with, you can even do them at a snail pace and let your adrenaline kick in during matches. It's the reason why the Falkenberg with pivot and cross footwork is especially popular, because it gives you a pretty good idea of how time your stroke to get power when you have to move large distances and maintain the ability to hit quality shots.

 

[blahness]

I also found it too difficult to implement both phases comfortably the first training session. I've decided to just focus on just doing the recovery step for now. My reasoning is that the recovery step helps to positively increase balance and mobility for the next stroke even without the preparation bounce.

Might take quite a while for the recovery step to become acceptable, but when I'm satisfied that I'm doing it for enough of my strokes, I'll switch over to focusing on the attack/preparation bounce. In between now and whenever that is, I'll continue to do the drill posted in the article.

If you find it too difficult to do both in practice, I posted articles in a different thread about skill acquisition being accelerated when focusing on one aspect per training session. So maybe for now it might be a good idea to focus on one step at a time.

Interleaving practice is also a proven method of accelerating learning, so it might even be better to do a movement drill where you do, for example, 5 minutes just focusing on the recovery bounce, and the next 5 on the preparation bounce, and go back and forth like that.

It's incredibly hard to incorporate completely new concepts at the table I found, usually what I do is massive amounts of shadow training and visualisation to get the feeling, and when I hit the table usually the muscle memory is already reformed. There will be remnants of the old muscle memory but those will be overwritten soon once you get more reps with the correct feeling.