Chilling out before the smash?
May 18, 2011 11:01 AM   Subscribe

How do I stay relaxed while playing a sport that requires incredible quickness and immediate accurate decisions?

I have become a table tennis addict. I'm female and have been playing about 2 years with a club full of guys who have been very supportive during my learning curve. I naturally have quick reflexes, so the speed of the game has not been a problem to me. In fact, the problem is learning how to wait long enough for my opponents' ball to reach me before I hit it. On a deeper level, I think that I am moving too fast because I am nervous and tense in the moment, even though I love to play. I tend to run on the nervous side in life anyway, so this isn't anything new. Plus, I'm an introvert, so playing with very confident men has been a little intimidating.

Any suggestions how I can keep that physical quickness while still remaining emotionally and mentally calm?
posted by alexgrey to Health & Fitness (10 answers total) 4 users marked this as a favorite
 
I think you get better at this kind of thing from the outside in - through training. Lots and lots of drills. Put a table-tennis table up against a wall and hit balls to yourself for half an hour a day. After a while of this you'll be much better at gauging exactly when to strike. The more of this skill you can assign to muscle memory, the less tense you'll be.
posted by Pickman's Next Top Model at 11:04 AM on May 18, 2011 [4 favorites]


In any sport, proper breathing is essential. When you hold your breath, your muscles don't move as well and you end up being slower than you would be if you were relaxed and breathing normally. Most Asian martial arts talk about abdominal breathing, where you expand your diaphragm rather than your chest which further helps prevent you from tensing up too much (mentally and physically). By the way, this is also the type of breathing used for meditation.

Practice your breathing while you practice your sport. That way you'll associate them with each other and when it comes to to play against an opponent, you'll be relaxed and loose.
posted by tommasz at 11:23 AM on May 18, 2011


I'm 100% with Pickman's (on preview: with tommasz too). The idea is to get the "muscle memory" down so rote that your arm does what's needed without you having to waste precious second-fractions consciously focusing on doing it. With increased experience, your sense develops of exactly how the ball is behaving as it's coming toward you; and since you've drilled on the movements you can respond without getting mired in the mechanics of it, freeing up your concentration to work on strategy - not just getting the ball back to the other side, but *where* on the other side you want to put it, with *what* spin....

It's not all that dissimilar to what musicians have to do to learn to improvise. They have to become familiar with the musical form, of course; they also have to do the drudge-work of scales and patterns to get their fingers to "know" how to play the notes they need without having to struggle mentally for how to play each note. All of which eventually frees up their focus to think up something pretty and inventive to play.

To review: practice, practice, practice.
posted by Greg_Ace at 11:29 AM on May 18, 2011


You could try developing a routine before each point to calm yourself down. When I played (full-size) tennis I would spin my racket twice in my hands, shuffle my feet, and take a deep breath before every point.

Also, as Pickman's says, repetition and muscle memory are huge in racket sports and table tennis since your reaction time is so low. Hit a few thousand balls and you'll probably be a lot better.
posted by ghharr at 11:32 AM on May 18, 2011


You have to get to the point where you don't care, and by that I mean a level of confidence where it doesn't matter whether you make or miss the shot, because you know that you're capable of making it more times than not. That's when you will feel relaxed.

This applies to most sports. It's a feeling of being as good as (or better than) your opponent, so that no matter what they throw at you, you're able to respond. There was a Nike commercial about 15 years ago in which Michael Jordan lists off how many shots he missed in his career...and why every miss made him better. That's what you should strive to attain, by not being afraid of mistakes. So go for the smash every time.
posted by unintelligentlydesigned at 11:39 AM on May 18, 2011 [1 favorite]


It will requirement some additional commitment, but I highly recommend yoga to improve mental acuity & focus. When I started cutting (a western equestrian sport involving cattle work), I was very unpleasantly surprised to find that my mind seemed to shift into day-dream mode as soon as I entered the herd - not good! I randomly selected yoga & figured I'd see what would happen.

The change in my mental focus was astounding. Not only did it allow me to remain fully in the present, I acquired a centered fluidity to adapt to lightning quick changes with nary a conscious thought. YMMV, but I wish you the best of luck!
posted by PepperMax at 11:54 AM on May 18, 2011


You're talking about "flow", that "being in the zone" feeling that's essential to sports performance. There are a bunch of books about it, but I think it's best taught hands on, if you can find someone local. IT's a bunch of mental focus and rehersal techniques designed to get you into an alert, calm, non-verbal state. A valuable skill which is transferrable to any physical task.
posted by bonehead at 11:57 AM on May 18, 2011


Relax your jaw. Sounds dumb but can make a huge and immediate difference.
posted by nicwolff at 12:02 PM on May 18, 2011 [1 favorite]


It sounds like you're lucky to have some spare mental bandwidth to use while the ball's coming. Channel that into strategy -- what spin are you going to use next, how's that going to get countered coming back at you, what's your next position after that, what has the opponent done in this situation before. Having 'too much time' is pretty common in twitch sports and finding something worthwhile to do while you're waiting your turn is where the bigger game comes in.
posted by felix at 1:58 PM on May 18, 2011


I also play a quick-reflex sport where moving too soon ruins your outcome. My trick is to wear pants that are a bit too big, and adjust them a lot between plays. Adjusting my pants takes my mind off the game for a minute and keeps me from the kind of hyperfocus that would make me anticipate a strike- it slows my reflexes just a bit. Could you do a similar (one-handed) move? Maybe wear your hair more down so you have to push wisps of hair back behind your ears sometimes while you play?
posted by pseudostrabismus at 4:07 PM on May 18, 2011


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