The Pendulum Serve (tutorial) - The World’s most used serve 

I'm making a C Drive library of your videos for repeated viewing. The more I watch them, then practice, the more my game improves. You vs other RU-vid instructors: 1) Clear articulation 2) Great demonstrations of each technique 3) Slow Mo of each technique 4) Top Tips ==>>> Your videos are pure gold!

This is actually the best ping-pong tutorial I've ever seen. To me, as someone who's only learning from RU-vid and not a real coach, having a very detailed explanation really helps me, especially because you explain the thing process.

It's my favorite serves! And I love the deception part where you merge the after-actions together. Much appreciated, Craig! For the next videos, I would love to see how you use these serves strategically to set up for a 3rd ball attack, or control where the 2nd ball will be returned to your side. Thanks.

Your tip on the loction of the table to ensure a quality short top spin , along with the simple yet brillant explanation of the top spin disguise ..best I have seen ... will definitely share your channel

Your SOSIA here Craig thank you so much for this video, because I want to improve this service! 💪🏻 The second part and third are the most dufficult for me

i prefer the bloopers because its closer to my own game ! Plus it shows you are human and aren't pretending to be perfect. Great instructive class !

I like your calmness: it's a welcome change from the overly enthusiastic videos we often get. Very soothing. Everything else is absolutely top notch: the 3 steps, the repeated placement argument, the location of the first bounce and why you choose to deceive towards the topspin motion. What I''m taking from this is going back to practicing pure sidespin pendulum with all the "minor adjustments" you advise and play practice matches with variation of placement alone. Then I might go back to where I am today: variation of spin. Deception is not for me yet: it screws up the spin itself. On the backhand I find much easier to include some deception and pull back the elbow before or after the contact. Thanks a lot!

Thank you for the lesson Craig!!!

Great video! Very well explained! Congrats!

Ben following you for some time now. Worth it fully Thank you!

I love the deception part in the video and very useful tips on doing the pendulum serves

Brilliant tutorial. Very methodical and instructive.

good commentation. especially 1st section about an angle. I have produced a backspin with a flat angle.

Great video. I will practice these spins this weekend.

Great video Craig, thanks 👍

New to this serve so Technique is my focus but motivation from seeing how it can be used. Thanks.

Amazing pendulum serve...very cool tutorial

Nice tutorial, thanks for taking the time to explain.

Awesome disseption ❤

very cool just what i was looking for, thank you!

Great video, good explanations and many details. Some people talk too much, not you Craig :) Thanks a lot!

Got some practicing to do now. Thanks man!

Really useful tips. Thanks a lot.

Great video! Thanks !

excellent tutorial for variety without changing the basics

Another great video! Thank you.

Thank you very much... great explanation...

Great video! Keep on the good work!

Thanks Craig, yet another great vid.

I truly appreciate the tips and advice for this video; it's truly helped a lot. Keep it up, coach. Greetings from the Philippines❤.

Thank you so much!! Now it's time to practice the serve 😄

Very, very cool and useful. Thankes a lot, Craig! ))

Craig, the man we need !

You are real master! Thank you a lot!

That was clear and useful, thank you!!

3... Great video, thanks!!!

love the videos, verry useful, easy step by step implementation, even as an intermediate level player could learn a lot from the breakdown explaination of those techniques

Very useful vedio in the right time thanks Mrs craig

Brilliant, thank you.

i really like these long tutorial videos. Very detailed. IF you somehow can add where you exactly hit the ball with a mark then i would be so happy. Golden delivery!

Love the videos. Be good to see some about returning these serves (and more left-handed versions).

Very nice content. Thanks so much

Part 3 for me ! Thanks for the video !

Great tutorial...I use this serve alot but picked up some new tips about the different spins...

Great tutorial.

awsome video !! thanks

Love this content Craig. I would like to see a video about the specifics of a good ball toss. I tought I should aim to have it as straight up and down as possible, but your toss seems to have some arc to it. Also, my toss is often all over the place, so I'd like to know the fundamentals on getting a solid, reliable toss everytime.

Very good service

Super informative. I started playing ping pong a couple of weeks ago. These videos are incredibly helpful.

thank you coach.

Thanks Craig

thanks so much

Thank you for the great tutorials. I watched some where the elbow was maintained very high throughout the serve. The claim was the muscle group was faster on the elbow down. I have also watched where the various spins changed by where the ball was contacted in the arc of the paddle. Backspin as the paddle is headed down and top spin as the paddle is arching up. The side spin changed as to where on the ball you did your magic. I would love to see this with a penholder grip too. I look forward to your thoughts.

Well done! Section 2 is really helpful for me, but also the outtakes are great 😂

Your serves are killer Craig!!

I am still learning it. Maybe it is going to get easier with your tutorial.

THIS IS GREAT CONTENT!

Nice! Can the service guy also show how to receive serves?

thank you!

New subscriber always watching your videos sir thank you for sharing❤

Hi I I love l your work Please don’t stop ❤ I would love to have another two videos The first one about disguising the reverse pendulum, serve And the other one about how to do a fast, Backhand serve ❤❤❤❤❤❤

Can you please do this from the other side of the table for doubles. Nice explanation indeed.

Thank you

Thank you very much, very useful. I have to work a lot to avoid hitting too much of the back of the ball, if I brush slightly it remains on my side of the table, if I hit it too strong it bounces directly on the other side...

Great video, coach! Hope you can do a dedicated tutorial like this for the Reverse-Pendulum Serve. It's my main serve and I want to see how you break it down.

Simply excellent. I'm currently focusing on part 1 and 2 as far as I'm concerned. I would recommend a view with another angle as a complement. It took me some time to understand that I was touching the ball too close to the table edge whereas I should touch it in front of my right heap. Best thanks again. Working hard with this video...

I don't usually comment but it's a pleasure to watch your videos, I'm a little frenchie amateur and listening to you helps me to practice both english and table tennis skills ! Keep it up :)

a common deception most people tend to forget about is to just vary the contact point of the bat during the serve; if you do mostly sidespin-underspin serves, you can implement some relatively dead balls with the almost exact same motion. The bat generates less spin at a more centered contact point. With that angle, it's tough to see the exact contact point, which will often lead to high bounces and easy third ball attacks. At the same time that will also make the underspin serve more effective as the opponent might be unsure and could over-compensate an adjustment. An issue could be indications of spin via sound, so a useful integration could also be to include a stomp at the contact-point to hide the sound.

A side comment. The number of views, within just a few days, compared to the number of subscribers shows how important such information is. With time, I think the number of subscribers will grow! :)

Good stuff. I don’t use the pendulum serve, but am ready to work on it tomorrow

insta like and comment for you Craig, u re the best!

Great video! Ive been looking for a video where it shows how to do the pendulum serve. I saw few of them but there isn't much detailed information like in your videos. Thanks for the video Sir ❤. And In future can you make a video on how to do the windshield wiper serve?

Muy buena che, saludos desde Argentina 🏓

Actually watched it. Very big improvement in quality comparing to your early videos with Tom. Not too slow, not too fast and I could clearly see what are you doing even without slow-mo. Exactly what is needed for a tutorial video ❤. Perhaps the brown doors and camera angle helped a lot.

For me it's a whole new discovery. I have never served in pendulum before. So I'll try it out. I often serve righthand underspin, lefthand sidespin, or righthand sidespin. I'm not good at righthand topspin serves. I think I need to loosen up a bit more the motion of my arm and wrist.

Sehr gut, danke

Thanks!

best video on pendulum i have ever seen. brilliant.

Thanks! I'd say I'm at 2. I know it, but am not consistently hitting all quadrant. And it's great to start thinking about deception.

Thanks. I hope you also make video where you teach how to hit back a spind serve so thaqt the ball doesn't bounce.

Hi Craig Lovely video! I have 1 question about the topspin variant: Is there wristmovement needed to create sidespin or is the sidespin created only by pulling the bat upward while contacting the ball on the side? Thanks for sharing all of your great tutorials!

Insta. Watched whole video, very informative. Will apply in the game.Thank you Coach

Really good video. Insanely precise and good explanation how to do the serve. You got a video for the tomahawk serve too?

Great video, I use the Matt Hetherington (Aussie guy) pendulum service and get back spin, side spin or top spin all from the same movement so all three look the same. He did service video during lock down and I found I could do it so adopted it. Saying this I like your back spin method with the bat angle.

Hi Craig, ❤ what your doinng. Really well explained. What probably most people struggle with is not the serve as such. I can imagine how to achieve the spin. My problem is achieving a consisten toss. How can I consistently get the ball in the ideal serve zone? Any input on how to achieve this withot practicing for 10'000 hours? Love to see a video about how to improve one's toss.

I usually struggle more with the reverse pendulum, but as it turns out I'm not as good at this one as I thought either lol. Great video! Maybe a video about a surprise fast flat serve from this position? I do that occasionally to catch my (albeit usually low-level amateur) opponents off guard, but I bet you'd know a lot more about that than me as well :D

The third one, working on the deceptive part

Great video. Could you do a video on how to read serves, particularly pendulum? I have a hard time reading spin on serves.

Nice bro

Hi Craig, could you create a video about receiving the serve. I think it's really helpful ❤

Thankss

I think your videos are the most comprehensive breakdown on how to do the different types of serve. Would you recommend mastering it without the deception first and adding that later?

I have mixed my pedulum serve with a kick serve. It has loats of side top-/backspin and it is fast. Almost every time an instant point.

Great

Nice work Craig. Something that I haven’t been able to find an explanation on, how fast is your bat speed to create spin and how do we know we’re creating good/great spin

Respect

Hi. Thanks very much for this. It was very helpful. Unfortunately I don't have a way to try this out. I would most fit into category 1 though...learning the technique. I haven't played in years but, mainly because of some decent tennis ability and overall quickness (hands and feet) and good hand-eye coordination, I got fairly decent at general table play, from getting to practice with a Vietnamese student at college who helped me improve my table tennis while I helped him improve his chess. We would regularly have nice rallies where we were both about four or more feet back from the table. But, my serve was never good, and my spin ability was relatively non-existent. I'd mainly just try to put the ball in play without getting killed on the return. This video was helpful though, but I am still a bit unclear on how to properly do the topspin serve using that grip. Back when I used to play (decades ago), I would just use my rallying grip (holding it very similar to how I did a tennis racquet), and I'd come under the ball...kind of like you demonstrated...to try to serve with underspin or sidespin, but for the topspin serve, I would basically use just a kind of abbreviated topspin shot like in the rallies...obviously destroying ANY chance at deception. hehe You did about as good a job though as you could in demonstrating things, including the very helpful slow-mo portions...otherwise, I wouldn't have understood the topspin part at all using that grip. So, I guess it mainly depends on my eventually having access again to a table and decent opponent so I can practice these serves and also once again enjoy the rallies. Thanks again. All the best from the US (i.e., "across the pond")!

Thk u

Hi Craig, I really enjoy the new content with you that you're offering in your channel but so far I think you're missing out on the aspects of your game and playing style which sets you apart from most other players. That being your superior qualities in deception, creative play, variation of tactics and upping or decreasing of preassure when necessary. Given that you're the master in this disciplines I'd very much like to see your channel to grow in this direction too! Thx so far for what you've delivered up until now!

Mr. Bryant is the Adrian Mannarino look a like in TT😉..super video