Master the Basics of Table Tennis Footwork

So we had a look at your strokes and strokes are really important to start off with. To link the strokes together though, you need to have good balance and good movement. It's fantastic to have fantastic forehand topspin, but if they don't put it in the wrong position for you, then you are always going to be in trouble if your balance and movement isn't good enough. So, let's take a look at your balance, your movement. So to start with, when you are playing table tennis, one of the key elements is your legs. You need to be down low and bending your knees well. So with side on, you can see that one knee is quite bent when on playing. So how do we move in table tennis? You have to remember that most of your movement is sideways, in fact, 95% of your movement is sideways. Very rarely you move in and out in table tennis. So how do we move sideways? Think about a shuffle step to start off with, that's probably the easiest way to start your movement when you are going sideways in table tennis. So I just shuffle in sideways. To do that, what you need to do is to get back to a balanced position so that you can just push off both legs. So back to balance and push off, balance and push off, balance, push off. If you try and push off when you are unbalanced, becomes a very difficult movement. So, the key is to get back to a balanced position and then use both your legs to push, balance and push, balance and push. With your feet you need to have them quite wide. So if you are very narrow to get down to the right position, you need to bend way too much. So get your feet wider apart, okay, and then you will increase your stability and increase your balance when you are playing. If you watch all the best players, they're always in this position when they are playing table tennis. As you start to get better and stronger with your legs, what you actually do is basically jumping sideways both ways, almost like you got a steel rod between your knees. So this stays quite still and you're just pushing here and pushing there. Basic Footwork Main Points 1. Bend your knees & get down low 2. Have your feet wide apart 3. Use a shuffle step 4. Balance is the key to good footwork www.PingSkills.com