Baal wrote: Berndt, I honestly don't care. I am simply not going to argue with people who dislike the sport I play and watch; especially over idiotic stuff that ITTF does, and players response to it -- since I have no control over any of it.  In spite of Sharara's efforts to mess everything up, the product still amazes me, such as the ML-FZD final at the WTTC this year.  I watch Chinese players closely.  They are better in nearly every dimension of the game than everyone else.  Right now the only European player who is close to their level is Ovtcharov.  Boll and Samsonov used to be, but they are passed their sell-by date (although I still love watching them).  The footwork, strength, balance, overall technique, and even tactical skills in the case of Ma Long, of Chinese players is superior.  That is not a product of any one rubber or a booster oil.  People who suggest that Hurricane + Booster are the sole reason they dominate make me laugh. I like jazz.  I once had a roommate who thought it was very uncool of me to like it.  He was into Hair Bands.  I tuned him out and went back to my Coltrane albums.  At some point since the lease was in my name, I threw him out.  This is a website devoted to table tennis -- as it is played now.  Keep it in mind

I am well aware that you do not care that virtually all of today's best players, including Ma Long and the rest of the Chinese National Team deliberately and with intent to augment the speed and spin of the rubbers they use, boost those rubbers with boosting oils, even when the rubbers some use are already factory boosted.  You have stated that a number of times, and also stated that there is nothing wrong with table tennis as it is played now and I presume also has been played since the introduction of boosting oils.  This is, as you are well aware, contrary to present ITTF regulations.  It is by definition illegal, and therefore also by definition cheating, despite what you or I might think of the ITTF as an exemplar of intellectual eminence and scholarship sublime.

Presumably the members of the Chinese National Team, who train in such a rigorous fashion as to make a Spartan shiver, should not need to have recourse to either factory boosted rubbers or factory boosted rubbers additionally augmented by boosting oils, as presumably they do not need them.  Why then do the members of the CNT, as do virtually every other international player who competes in an ITTF sanctioned competition, feel that they have to boost their rubbers with boosting oils, a practice pretty much known to many people who follow international table tennis tournaments?

And why then should any player who willfully and deliberately ignores an ITTF regulation deserve admittance to the International Table Tennis Hall of Fame, no matter how impressive his or her table tennis accomplishments?


Edited by berndt_mann - 09/14/2017 at 5:13pm

August 18, 2015

Tue, 08/18/2015 - 12:48 — Larry Hodges

Table Tennis Boosting and Why Cheating is Rampant in Our Sport

Here's an article by Coach Jon Gustavason about the problems with boosting (and perhaps speed gluing) in table tennis. He wrote, "It also appeared that at least some of the players were using boosters or speed glue on their rackets. There is absolutely no way of knowing how much was taking place, since there was no attempt to test rackets and — even if there had been — current testing methods can’t detect every possible way that table tennis rubbers can be altered."

Next to the problems with hidden serves, this is the most abused rule in table tennis at the higher levels. The rules state, "The racket covering shall be used without any physical, chemical or other treatment." This makes both speed glue and boosting illegal. 

Boosting is the problem, not speed gluing. Boosting on a tensor sponge gives nearly the same effect but is essentially undetectable, and unlike speed glue, has little health risks. I'd be surprised if any but a tiny minority still speed glue. First, if they did, you can hear the unique sound it makes, and we'd know. Second, it's the top players who are most likely to look for such enhancements, and they know that their racket likely would be tested at the biggest tournaments, and so they wouldn't be able to speed glue at the tournaments that are likely most important for them. Third, and probably most important, I'm told that speed glue doesn't really work well with modern tensor sponges, which just about every top player uses. So what's the point? A tensored sponge that's boosted gives the effect of speed glue without being detectable. (Also, where would they get the speed glue? It's no longer being produced by manufacturers. They'd have to go back to the old bicycle glues used in the 1970s, which aren't as effective as the ones produced later for table tennis.)

Others have protested about the boosting problem. Here's an article from Tabletennista, "Jun Mizutani Boycotts ITTF For His Battle Against Illegal Boosters." (Mizutani is world #6.) It's a worldwide problem.

So it is boosting that is the problem. (Most estimates are that it increases spin and speed about 10%.) I'm not going to name names, but it's pretty much common knowledge that nearly every top player boosts. Not all - there are a few who simply won't do it because it's illegal. For example, Samson Dubina has gotten involved in this issue as he's a top U.S. player who is regularly handicapped because he won't "cheat," and so he doesn't boost, while most of his opponents likely do. When he complained to an official while I listened, the official simply encouraged him to boost himself, since others were doing so. Yes, as Samson can verify, the referee/umpire told him to cheat. The official also argued that few others are complaining – but that's because nearly all of the players are boosting, so of course they aren't complaining! (There's also a top player at my club who faces this same dilemma, as he refuses to boost since it's cheating – but he's getting tempted. "Come to the dark side, we have cookies and booster!")

It's somewhat similar to the problem with steroids and other performance enhancing drugs in sports. They weren't legal, but large number of players used them for decades despite the fact that they were both risking their health and their reputations by cheating. With boosting, there is little danger of either, and so it's pretty much commonplace. I've watched players routinely boost for years; many probably don't even know it's illegal. (Unlike speed glue, which is done just before playing, boosting is done well before you play, and lasts much longer.) 

I'm sure some are wondering just what boosting is. Sorry, I'm not going to tell you. I'm sure with a little research you can find it on your own. When/if it becomes legal (or essentially legal, as explained in #3 below), I'll post about it. 

So how can we solve this problem? I've already tried to solve it, but met up with bureaucratic roadblocks. Just like steroids before, many of the current generation of officials simply don't take the problem seriously - it's out of sight, out of mind thinking, plus they don't want the hassle of dealing with a mostly invisible problem - even though they are really hurting players who won't "cheat."

Let's look at this logically. I see three possibilities. 

1. Ignore the problem, allow rampant cheating, and handicap those who won't cheat. Sorry, this isn't acceptable to me. 
2. Spend extremely large sums of money on extremely sensitive equipment that'll detect boosting. (It would probably have to be developed for this express purpose.) Unfortunately, this just isn't affordable and so isn't feasible.
3. Change the rules (or to resolve the problem in the U.S., just the USATT Tournament Guide) to specify that any racket that passes the racket testing procedure shall be deemed legal for that tournament. Then boosting becomes normal, and the only change is that the few top players who currently don't boost because it is illegal will no longer be handicapped since their boosted rackets would be declared legal.

Number three seems the only possible solution. Some would argue that they would still be cheating, since they have used a "treatment" on their racket – but any treatment is a matter of degree. Cleaning your rubber with water or racket cleaner is a treatment, but doesn't rise to the level that's considered a treatment. All this does is set the limit for what is considered to have been a treatment.

Edited by berndt_mann - 09/14/2017 at 7:15pm

OK in all seriousness, as an economics student (long paragraph[s] alert)

Edited by SmackDAT - 09/14/2017 at 9:32pm

Fulanodetal wrote: The rule is stupid!! - Boosting oils are widely available. - VOCs are not present in these oils so they are not a health risk. - This only applies to official ITTF tournaments. - Factory tuned rubbers make the ITTF's position ambiguous. - The ITTF is unable to enforce the rule for lack of equipment. - The ITTF real agenda is to slow down game play, it's not about the health risks to the players or     keep the game fair for everyone. The ITTF is in the business of making money, I don't buy for one    second they really care about the players health of fairness of the games otherwise they would deal with the issue of illegal serves which IS a bigger problem than the use of boosters. - The new plastic ball is another effort by the ITTF to slow down the game. I don't buy the BS that it was about making it safer bc celluloid was flammable or whatever. They made celluloid balls for nearly a century, what took them so long to decide? Sometimes rules are stupid and should be changed. For example, once SLAVERY was legal! But we recognised it was wrong and we changed the laws. The US got in a terrible civil war over it while other countries simply changed the laws regarding slavery. Another example of a failed policy.... FdT

if the game slows down you create the perfect market for table tennis companies anf new rubbers and blades will be required to adapt the new ball the ittf is the salesman of the tt industry

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1485041144925021&id=145007505595065

Berndt is stuck in the past. He still living in the mid 1950's. No Beatles, No Stanley Kubrick, no JFK, no Moon landing, no Michael Jackson, no MTV, no Playstation, no internet....oops, we found a flaw!! He did find the internet somehow!!!

Edited by Fulanodetal - 09/15/2017 at 10:12am

Berndt, your argument leads nowhere. It is mostly a waste of words.
I have neither the time nor energy to make my point clear to you.
And chances are you might not understand anyway.

Ittf will not ban boosters. They are economically dependent on the rubber manufacturers. This has been mentioned here before. They either will keep it vague like this to make anyone happy or just flat out allow it. I however doubt that they will do the latter, because it would lead to more people boosting themselves, resulting in lower sales of preboosted rubbers. There should be rubber manufacturer lobbyists among the ITTF officials, so these will protect their interests.

Capitalism is mighty and its mechanics apply to tt as they do anywhere else.

I dunno - it seems pretty simple to me.

" But those of them that boost their own rubbers (whoever they are) are still cheating. The fact that the ITTF can't detect it doesn't make it OK. The possibility that almost every pro is doing it also doesn't make it OK."

Edited by Fulanodetal - 09/16/2017 at 12:48am

RR, I missed you at the LA Open... maybe you come out to Westside for the Round Robin in a few weeks when I roll into town again...

Actually if you read Berndt's last comment carefully (final paragraph), he is in essence saying that no player from Klampar and Joyner on deserves to be called great, except possibly Timo and JM, if in fact the chemicals that produce a boosting effect are truly missing from their rubbers.

This is in fact an evolution of his views, since it includes a number of players from after 1959! 

roundrobin wrote: Greg, so you basically agree with Berndt that because Ma Long could be cheating, no one should ever consider him greater than any of the hardbat era champions that Berndt worships so feverishly?

Greg, you throw the word "cheater" around too readily. Aren't you a cheater too in life? When was the last time you drive above the speed limit? Today? Never? Have you ever crossed a street not using the lawfully designated pedestrian crosswalk? Like it or not, there are different degrees of cheating. Equating Ma Long's use of a boosted rubber to Lance Armstrong' extensive use of oxigenated blood transfusions and PEDs does not make sense unless you are Jesus yourself. If you are not Jesus then you are also a cheater like all of us. Stop accusing others of being cheaters without taking everything into context.

Edited by roundrobin - 09/16/2017 at 7:18pm

roundrobin wrote: Greg, you throw the word "cheater" around too readily. Aren't you a cheater too in life? When was the last time you drive above the speed limit? Today? Never? Have you ever crossed a street not using the lawfully designated pedestrian crosswalk? Like it or not, there are different degrees of cheating. Equating Ma Long's use of a boosted rubber to Lance Armstrong' extensive use of oxigenated blood transfusions and PEDs does not make sense unless you are Jesus yourself. If you are not Jesus then you are also a cheater like all of us. Stop accusing others of being cheaters without taking everything into context.