Hit-Brush Explained

ZingyDNA wrote: beeray1 wrote: Does anyone know the chinese term for this? I was trying to explain to my friend who's been cycled through the chinese system, and he had no idea what I was talking about.  Get him to watch the video in OP. It's in Chinese.

Da mo in mandarin

Da mawe in Cantonese

In general, also for flathit component, an accellerating bat state increases dwelltime.  A long proven fysics principle for collisions.
Accelleration is result of change of force, not necessarily force.
For instance starting a backhand stroke with the hand and bat cocked inwards builds a tension in the muscles and tendons that keep the hand cocked in.  All it needs then to accellerate the bat forward shortly before ballcontact is to relax these muscles. A collision with an accellerating paddle, sorta makes it more difficult for the ball to escape from the paddle.  It creates more dwelltime for better using (thick) sponge and topsheet for spin and speed.

Relaxing the muscles from holding the paddle back also releases the elastic energy that had time to build in a more flexible blade from the first acelleration by other muscles. 
That,s why the more flexible blades can be fast and spinny when they are in good hands or slow in not so good hands (or at least not trained for using more flexible blades).
offcourse a whiplike flex release also adds to the accelleration on the ball and probably the most and - thus - adds to the dwell also for the sponge and topsheet and to make what is discussed here, work out for more spin. 




Edited by mercuur - 10/03/2014 at 6:13am

It's not through contact but the complete path of the stroke.

Let me give an example that might help, racquetsforsale.  Look at ZJK's banana flick (or any good banana flick in slow motion).  You will wonder for the life of you why it is called a banana flick if you don't actually perform the stroke.

Edited by V-Griper - 10/04/2014 at 7:14pm

NextLevel wrote: Let me give an example that might help, racquetsforsale.  Look at ZJK's banana flick (or any good banana flick in slow motion).  You will wonder for the life of you why it is called a banana flick if you don't actually perform the stroke.

Are you talking about the shape or path of the swing now?

The original discussion is regarding whether there should be or needs to be a CONSCIOUS, DELIBERATE, PROACTIVE action to change the blade angle through contact (or throughout the swing if you want to add that to the discussion) and whether this type of an action produces shot characteristics that cannot be replicated otherwise. The person in the video appears to think "yes" in both cases, because otherwise it would be pointless to talk about something that happens naturally anyways.

Viewed in slow motion, chances are the shape of my swing would appear concave up when looping heavy underspin and concave down when counterlooping, and everything in between, and my blade angle would vary with my swing path accordingly. In super slow motion, my wrist would appear to lag a bit before catching up with the forearm at contact.

The key is and my contention is I'm not consciously managing the change of the blade angle throughout the swing. Any movement of my wrist (in the context of this discussion) is a result of human anatomy and physics: I'm swinging a mass and there is a joint between it and my forearm, namely my wrist, so there's inevitably some give. To keep my wrist completely locked throughout the swing, I'd need a brace.

kurokami wrote: it's a little bit older technique back when ppl used the wrist more.  i've heard this as well from prev gen pros and you can hear this as well from zhang yining's interview on how to hit the ball: <span style="line-height: 1.4;">contact is not one constant stroke but "hitting a little, spinning a little (wrist adj.), and pressing down a little (covering racket angle)."</span> <span style="line-height: 1.4;"> </span> some, particularly older gen pros, will make wrist adj. at the close of their stroke. not sure if this was what OP is talking about earlier.

Not adjustment. A conscious effort to hit and then spin. I don't think this is an old or outdated concept either. It's still widely discussed. There is a second part to his video in which he speculates that perhaps closing of the blade interferes with the ball's path as it comes off of the rubber and perhaps that is the source of the special feeling of "hit-brushing."