It’s time for me to explain in more details the reasons, why I think the extension of a basket is so important for the robot. As you probably remember, some people already use robots from my first batch, and I carefully analyze their feedback. Almost all of them said that they really want to have a bigger basket for balls.
You probably agree, that when you are trying to bring to perfection some technical element – each additional ball matters a lot. But it’s even more frustrating when the element just starts to work out (you’ve been going to this for so long!) and the basket suddenly appears to be empty.
Obviously, you have to stop and then start again, which results in loss of pace. I know that there are some compact robots on the market with the baskets that contain no more than 30 balls. Maybe it would be enough for somebody, but I can not imagine effective training with such kind of equipment.
Let’s make some calculations! In an ordinary game, even an amateur player takes about 30-40 balls per minute. But when the skills start to grow, the game pace is also rising. For example, one of my clients shared this drill with me:
This program consists of 4 shots:
- The first is a serve with back-side spin. Because this guy wanted to make a pause between drill cycles, he has set up 3 seconds interval before the first shot (serve).
- The next 3 shots are balls with strong topspin and interval of 0.9 sec between them.
- After the 4th shot, the program again returns to serve #1.
Do you think it’s a quick pace? It is not at all! Just an ordinary game-pace for a person who already learned something in table tennis. Thus said, one 4-balls cycle of a game takes about 6 seconds. It means that when you have 100 balls in a basket, you can practice an exercise for 2.5 minutes. But with the basket of 180 balls, the time increases to 4.5 minutes, which is a pretty good duration for a multiball session.
P.S. Speaking about this specific customer — today he is very pleased to have an extended version of a robot! From now on he has regular weekly training and thinking about selling his old robot (it has only one wheel) from a well-known manufacturer.