Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Shenzhen Ping Pong: SuperCPen S

This is the final installment of my series on experimenting with the SuperCPen concept.

Due to some morphological and possibly stroke-related issues with the SuperCPen handle width (56mm), I recently had a Butterfly Innerforce ZLC penhold blade re-converted into SuperCPen size S (44mm wide). The blade weighs 78g (without rubber).

I can report that the SuperCPen size S seems to fit my hand much better than the regular SuperCPen handle. Unlike the full width version, I can hold it comfortably for an extended amount of time. This could be because my hand is smaller than what the regular SuperCPen was designed for.

For relevant prior discussion, see previous blog post here

Anyhow, let's go to the video!


Link: here
(Thanks to Jeff Duan, practice partner.)

Compare the strokes above to the video clip in the prior post using the thumbgrip-modified SuperCPen (see link here. Can you detect a difference in the strokes?

Observations

Generally, I seem to cope better with the SuperCPen S than the full SuperCPen. However, I have noticed two tendencies which doesn't seem to forebode well:
  1. I get index finger creep, i.e. my index finger seems to want to move up the handle as I play. This puts undue pressure on the first joint of the finger and causes some pain.
  2. When I cock my wrist back for the reverse backhand, my wrist feels strained and occasionally it hurts when I execute the wrist flick.
None of these symptoms occur with the thumbgrip-modified SuperCPen that I have been using. It could be simply that I'm fighting the blade in the sense I want to adjust how I hold the handle rather than adjusting my stroke to suit how I hold the handle. I may need to go slow on the SuperCPen S if I am to avoid an overuse injury.

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