Pingpong and kungfu are two sports that you would have to live them if you want to play them. Pingpong players are the homeless bunch, picking up skills off the streets, while kungfu masters are aristocrats, with choriographed movements down to the very finger tips and almost as if carved on the tombstones of former masters of generations past. Nevertheless, pingpong is as real as life, while kungfu is as fake as movies. Is it possible to marry the two. Then we get pongfu.
Pongfu unifies theory and practice. When knowledge of the sport is linked directly to its success, we will finally create one sport that is not going to depend mainly on natural ability and hard work. Now anyone can play it well as long as it's played right. The chance of a women world champion is as good as a men champion. Could it be the first unisex sport?
The central theme of kongfu's design is speed. Since shorter the stem the speedier is the game, as the penholder is faster than the shakehand, the pongfu paddle is constructed with zero stem length.
The palm racket's stem is in the back of the blade. The stem fits snugly in the hand like a glove. The grip is similar to the penholder style, with the back of the blade being flushed with the thumb and the index finger.
To max the speed, the blade is designed to pick up the ball right off its bounce. So in countering spins, all four corners of the blade are widened for easy contact with the ball. Without the stem being in the way, the blade can move very close to the table surface.
The square stance of today's pingpong player is simply suicidal from kungfu's point of view. Obvious the stance of a fencer perpendicular to the end of the table is the correct choice. Besides this fencing stance, pongfu needs to pay special attention to what to do with the unoccupied hand.
Imaging we want the balance that a cat achieves with the use of its tail. But the very asset that gives the cat this ability would be a liability to us. So our struggle is how to turn the unoccupied arm into a cat's tail.
This brings us to the way the incredible Chinese women pingpong players developed their playing style. We will focus on the two recent champions, Deng Yaping and Wang Nan.
In general, Chinese women players are much more disciplined with their empty arm than other players, including the men. Like in fencing, these women players have been able to better dictate the tempo of the game.
In half decade of evolution, Deng Yaping has increase the downward whipping power of her left arm while doing backhand stroke. But due to the sacrifice of speed for power, the best part of her game is still in defense.
Now comes Wang Nan. She is always on top of a rally. She does that by whipping her other arm upward, as this allows quick recovery for the next shot.
Well, both techniques are tough to master. But our's is pongfu. We have to go for the limit. Let's look at what people do when their lives are at stake as in fencing.
The generally accepted practical way of the fencer is whipping the arm from naturally raised position downward with the palm facing up, opposite to Deng's facing down. This is fine, but it is still suspect. The modern day fencers may be avoiding the classical style, since today we only need to win, but the classical fencer had to stay alive.
So pongfu's style is raising the arm as high as possible and whipping it backward and downward to a horizontal position. And the added advantage is the use of this arm as a early-warning radar sensor that can guide the movement of the rest of the body.
The serve's sole purpose is to get a fast exchange going. It is flat and fast, but directionally deceptive.
1.2
PONGFU -- WHAT
1.3
PINGPONG DOCTOR
1.5
PONGFU DRILLS
1.33
OLD FOOL, YOUNG FOOL AND PONGFOOL
1.45
PONGWU -- PONGFU WU OR DANCE
1.49
DO SPORTS NOT WAR
1.50
PINGPONG PLAN
1.51
HIGH-TECH GADGETS
1.52
FUTURISTIC LARGE-STADIUM DISPLAY
1.53
PRACTICE MAKES A PONGFOOL
1.56
GOOD OLD PINGPONG
