Table tennis rules - performing legal serves
One of the most important table tennis rules to follow is making sure that when you serve, it's a legal serve. Failure to consistently deliver proper table tennis serves can be traced back to the lack of proper coaching combined with little or no exposure in tournament play.
USATT table tennis rules are simple and to the point and following them is to your advantage. Here are a few of the more important things to remember when your serving.
- The ball must be shown in the palm of your hand before serving it.
- Your hand must be flat so you are not cupping it...which would cause the ball to be hidden, thus making the serve illegal.
- The table tennis ball has to be thrown at least six inches into the air with the ball being hit only while it's on the way down.
- Your serve has to land in between the two white sidelines of the table tennis table
- The ball can't hit lower than the table and also behind the front of the tables white line.
Practice those key factors so you won't get marked off for the point when you least expect it. Just remember that when competing in an sanctioned USATT tournament, these rules are strictly enforced.
Sometimes when playing against fellow club members, they might not call you out on your illegal serves or you might not call out their illegal shots. Either way that practice of lazy serving isn't good for your table tennis game play because it can be habit forming.
The next thing you know you get eliminated at your USATT tournament because of your inability to serve within the rules. Try and change your style and you will more than likely lose the point because of not being comfortable with your sudden, new way of having to serve.
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21 Sep 2007
Topshot table tennis wrote:
Table tennis basic rulesTable tennis is a simple game; you don't need to master a complex set of regulations to play the game. However, there are a few basic rules you should know before playing the game for the first time, as they will help you enjoy table tennis more. A game of table tennis starts by deciding which player will serve first. This can be done by a coin toss, but normally by one of two methods - either playing a rally with the winner getting to decide who'll serve first, or, more simply, by ...
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