OOAK Table Tennis Forum

speedplay wrote


As I understand it, the decision was based on health reasons but these were tied in with the ITTF's desire not to fall foul of the Olympic Movement's - Agenda 21,

"3.2.9 Management of hazardous products, waste and polution

... to avoid using products recognized as being hazardous or toxic to humans..."

As the ITTF wants table tennis to remain an Olympic sport they didn't really have a choice in banning voc's and as a consequence ensuring the demise of speed glue. And to be fair, the ITTF gave plenty of notice which I find confusing. If voc's in speed glue are dangerous, you don't wait years to ban it, you do it straight away.

I think therefore, VOC / speed glues were banned by the ITTF to comply with Olympic requirements which just happened to revolve around "health issues".

To put it in a simple way, it is not correct to describe a substance as generally hazardous or toxic. It depends on certain factors. The same substance can be both absolutely safe and toxic. This goes for VOC too.

Hence speed glue can not be banned automatically, just because it contains VOC.

No, I don't think we would ever approve any type of booster or tuner because we have absolutely no control on what the product would be. A solid peace of equipment can have an ITTF logo on it to show that it is authorized or approved. But when you approve a glue or a boosters, we could only put the logo on the container, but you never know what is in the container.
In any case, our idea is to have a difference between the International level events and all other events. We would have extremely strict tests at the international level, and only rackets that pass the test would be allowed. Whereas at the other levels, we would ease up the controls. Now, the trick is how to achieve this?

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Adham Sharara

Well, this is exactly what you do with rubbers too...!
You approve the topsheet and let the manufacturer do whatever he wants with the sponge. Provided the total thickness is under 4.0mm and there's no detectable VOC, he can treat, modify, heat, add some chemical, etc...
Tensors by ESN, spring sponge by BTY, Blue whale tuned by Haifu. What is done to the sponge is totally out of your control, but still you authorise manufacturers to show your logo onto the final product. Isn't there some contradictions here ?
Also, ITTF doesn't seem bothered to forbid boosters, why on earth should there be a problem to authorize them. You have found enough scientists to demonstrate that this or that is dangerous, it shouldn't be too difficult to ask them what is not. Unless they tell you that EVERYTHING might be dangerous if not properly used. EG : Playing ping pong hardbat is safe until I hit my opponent with the bat and forces him to ingest the ball. Should we forbid the bat and the ball ? Shall we play shadow ping pong in front of the mirror now ?

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Joola Rossi Emotion
T64 + Express one

In fact it is not the same at all. I suppose you mean "sponge" and not rubber. We do not approve or authorize sponge for the same reason that we do not now authorize glue or boosters. The authorization mark (ITTF logo) would not be visible on the sponge after glued to the racket and covered by the rubber above. Unless we find a way of doing it on the side of the sponge (2mm thickness), but that is not easy to do. So, we just measure the thickness, measure for VOC, flatness, etc. This is all we can do. To authorize or approve glue or any liquid substance would provide the opposite effect. We found that some players will use the container with the ITTF logo on it and then put anything they want in it, but claim that this is an approved glue. So there is no sense in approving something that we cannot control at all with our approval system.

Regarding health issues, the glue was banned for that reason, and all boosters tested were also found to be toxic to various degrees. But this is not the issue with boosters. The issue is that they alter the rubber after it has been approved. The direction the ITTF is going is to allow the manufacturers, under controlled methods in the factory, to obtain the so-called "speed-glue effect" and deliver to the market, after extracting all the VOCs, a clean racket covering or a clean racket that has the speed-glue effect but that meets the ITTF regulations.

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Adham Sharara

Of course, it is possible, that those members of Board of Directors, who voted in favour of speed glue ban, did it, because they believed, that VOC were dangerous. But:

I did not find any evidence on the internet, that speed glue, if normally used, leads to health problems.

Also In 3 English speaking forums I did not find any reference to such evidence.

Speed glue does contain VOC. So do carpets and newspapers. Certain levels of certain substances, including VOC, are absolutely safe, and certain levels are dangerous. I did not find any proof, that VOC level in the air reaches dangerous level, if speed glue is normally used.

Keep looking and you may eventually find the evidence. In the meantime, you decide for yourself and your children whatever you want. Let them play with lead-painted toys, drink melamine-laced milk and sniff speed glue, as long as you are comfortable with it. At the ITTF, we do not like to take such risks, so we ban what is under our control, which we believe is harmful for the kids playing our sport. Then of course, the daily controls belong to the parents and they can advise their kids as they wish. In Germany, speed glue was forbidden for children under 15 years of age. It is also illegal to cross borders with it, and as you may know it is illegal to take on board a flight (for different reasons).

In any case, the rule was passed in 2004, implemented in 2008, and is now the rule. There is no proposition to change it. So why dwell on it? The ITTF membership has no intention to change it, so let's accept and move on.

By the way, there is evidence that the dramatic increase in autistic children is due to the chemicals around us in every day life and the chemicals in our foods. There is an alarming increase of autism over the last 10 years. It is best to eliminate all types of chemicals (including in carpets, paints, etc.) from our every day use. As you know, now people prefer to use only water-based paints, VOC-free furniture, etc.

In fact, there is no concrete evidence either that smoking cigarettes causes cancer. But as you said, most cities are turning smoke-free. Prevention, my friend, prevention.

Did you know that there are no preventive drugs? ALL drugs on the market are to treat a disease, but there are no drugs to prevent a disease. This is a fact. It is simply a matter of economics, the drug companies do not invest in preventive medicine, they only invest in drugs they can sell to treat a disease. This is a huge issue now. Governments are pushing for generic "preventive" drugs for those with a disposition to get certain diseases (heredity, work hazards, etc.). One of the very few preventive drug that is prescribed by doctors under the (cross prescription method) is Aspirin as a preventive drug for strokes and heart attacks. Of course Aspirin is not completely preventive, but it does keep the blood thinner so reduces the risks. But drugs could exist to eliminate the risk of heart attacks for those most at risk (hereditary, genetic, etc.).

I believe the ITTF did the responsible thing, and those that are not happy are free to use speed glue, sniff it, and even eat it, but in the privacy of their own homes and not at ITTF events. What the ITTF has said is "Consumer beware". And we police our own events. What people do outside the controlled environment is entirely up to them.

Bon apetit (lunch time in Ottawa now)

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Adham Sharara

Hi adham, first of all thanks for providing the clear explanation about why the board of directors added the friction requirement to pimpled rubber. As far as i know this is the only place it has publicly been explained. I don't agree with the reasoning, but that's the way it goes.



How about this:

1. Authorize all rubber topsheets in one color only - clear transparent, with the logo and identifying marks molded on the lower left side.

2. Authorize all foam rubber (sponge) in two colors, red and black, with the logo and identifying marks in reverse colored text on the lower right side.

3. Rubber can be used without sponge (including inverted, ha!) only if glued onto a blade that's been dyed either red or black, in which case no sponge identification is required.

4. Part of both topsheet and sponge identification includes a 1 cm square box that officials can compare with a reference box using a loupe.

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Equipment: Matsushita PowerDefence, Spin Art 1.9 black, Xiying 979 ox red
Style: American | US Rating: barely 2000

Brilliant idea. I have to ask the manufacturers if they could produce a transparent rubber. But you gave me an even simpler idea, why not on the bottom right have a sort of "window" in the rubber (1 sq. cm is enough) which would show the ITTF logo on the sponge?

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Adham Sharara

You would probably get complaints about surface continuity and so on. Plus, they'd probably have to drastically change their manufacturing processes to cut the window out.

What about a "ledge" for the logo instead at the bottom? A small 5mm strip of sponge across the bottom that does not have any rubber over it - the rubber starts 5mm higher up.

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Chasse Patate

And raise their prices accordingly as well...

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Joola Rossi Emotion
T64 + Express one

Thank you !
Again, that's what you do with boosters...You forbid them and you have no tool to control wether they are used or not. Why is there "no sense in approving" while there is sense in forbiding. Circumstances are identical and decision is different.

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Joola Rossi Emotion
T64 + Express one

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Go this way and read thoroughtly the documents of
-- Facts about Speedglue
-- Glue Health Report
http://tensor.de/download

Ever Yours
Igor

This is even better and even more simple. I will discuss with the Equipment Committee and the manufacturers during the World Championships in Yokohama.

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Adham Sharara

I beg to differ. You can forbid something and then the responsibility belongs to the user. But if you "approve" something, then the responsibility belongs to the body that approved it. Let me give you an example:
- IOC bans Anabolic Steroids. Then it is the responsibility of each athlete to avoid such substances and the IOC tests for them. The IOC tests are always one step behind the masking agents, but they continue to ban and continue to test. They do not say because we cannot detect we abandon the tests.
- The IOC oes not produce a list of "approved" substances.

The ITTF is starting with new testing equipment to detect boosters. This will be fully implemented on 1 July 2009. We could implement immediately, but we prefer to "educate" the players first. So we started at the Qatar Open to give the results of the players of the new testing instrument "Elize". In fact 77 rackets failed the Elize tests although they passed the Enez VOC test. We will do the same at the World Championships. This will give a chance to the players to realize that their rackets are not legal. By the way, in Qatar 140 rackets did pass the test. This is good news.

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Adham Sharara