I’ve been in Europe for 8 days now and boy how time has flown. I flew to Vienna and spent 4 days training together with the Austrian and Hungarian national teams, who are both preparing for the Olympics that start next week. I had great sessions with Robert Gardos (WR29), Daniel Habesohn (WR69), Adam Pattantyus (WR80), Daniel Zwickl (WR131) and Stefan Fegerl (WR141) and left in much better shape than when I arrived. It is not always easy to get access to that level of sparring and to be able to fit in 7 sessions with those guys was very successful. The main difference I find is the pace of the play. The ball is coming so quickly at you and you are forced to react in as little time as possible. You can’t afford to be passive or hold back or the ball goes past you very quickly.

Training with World Number 29 Robert Gardos

From Vienna, I flew to Stuttgart in Germany and got on a train to a practice tournament I was playing in Biberach, which is close to top German club Ochsenhausen (who recently signed 2004 Olympic Singles Champion Ryu Seung Min for next season). The tournament was part of the Challenger Series which is financed by betting companies who put up prize money and offer the players free accommodation and hospitality. The matches are broadcast live over the internet and there are constantly changing betting odds. Apparently the betting is popular in Russia and Asia; hence we had some unusual starting times.

It is the strangest tournament I’ve ever played I think. The tournament runs for 3 days and matches begin at 8:30am each day. There are 8 players and you play best of 5 matches on a rolling schedule. There is one match table (to make streaming and betting simpler) and one practice table. You practice with your opponent in the upcoming match. It’s one thing to practice with Bob (Robert Frank) before our matches, as we know each other’s game inside out) however I’d never played many of the players I faced in the tournament so it was a weird feeling to be doing your warm-up with them. The first matches of the day were difficult, as you would only be delivered to the hall about 20 minutes before the match started. So it would be a short warm-up and when the music stopped, the match was on.

This was apparently one of the toughest Challenger events yet with a starting filed including Evgueni Chtchetinine (WR73), Adam Pattantyus (WR80), Thomas Keinath (WR90), Daniel Zwickl (WR131) and three solid league players who don’t play internationally. I started with two losses against the two choppers (Chtchetinine and Pattantyus) which didn’t come as a big surprise. I’ve barely played and practiced against choppers for 4 years and my game isn’t particularly well suited. Taking the ball early off the bounce with fast wrist movements isn’t exactly compatible with playing heavy, heavy backspin!! I lost 3-1 in each match. I won two matches and then dropped a 2-0 lead against Zwickl. I simply became too passive after 2-0 and he took control of the match.

This is the whole show

I needed a big finish to make it into the top 4 players, who then go on to playing semi-finals. I played a blinder of a match against Keinath first up this morning and won 3-0. My play was almost flawless for long periods of the match. Keinath had a great World Championships a few months back beating players like Koki Niwa (WR16), Kirill Skachkov (WR41) and Alexey Smirnov (WR46) so I was very pleased to beat him. It’s certainly amongst one of my better wins. It came down to the last match and I was able to Brice Ollivier from France 3-1 and finish in third position. I came up against Chtchetinine in the semi. I got killed in the 1st set, won two close sets in a row and had 9-9 in the fourth set. I lost that set and then lead 7-3 in the fifth. It wasn’t to be and I went down 11-9.

I was pleased with my play and felt like I was improving the whole way through the competition. The purpose of coming was to get good match practice before London and I felt like I well and truly achieved that goal!

I’ve got a session with the coach of Ochsenhausen, and former top international, Dmitry Mazunov tomorrow morning, and then spend a night in Stuttgart before flying off to England on Friday morning to meet up with the rest of the Australian table tennis team. I’m feeling good (despite having a sore shoulder after all the matches against choppers!) and feel like I am over my recent health issues. It is very nice to be back having summer again after three straight winters.