A ceremony was held today in Beijing to announce the release of a new stamp to honor 93 table tennis champions from China.
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This is a very interesting use for ping pong balls - a ping pong ball chandelier.
Celebrities Playing Table Tennis is such a cool website with over 700 photos (and over 400 celebrities) playing ping pong.
You can find pictures of Bill Gates, Tiger Woods, Fidel Castro, Bill Clinton, and others playing.
The Philadelphia Inquirer published an article today that outlines the huge popularity and performance gap between China and the United States. The best table tennis players in the world are from China, and the gap is widening. The sport draws huge crowds in China and the popularity and participation continue to grow.
Table tennis a smash in China, not in U.S. - The Philadelphia Inquirer
And as the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, where no tickets are harder to get than those for table tennis, figure to make evident, the Ping-Pong gap between China and the United States is widening like the Yangtze River at flood tide.
“Chinese players outnumber Americans by at least 1,000 to 1, probably more,” said Danny Seemiller, the U.S. men’s coach. “In China, it’s thought of as a sport. It has credibility as a sport. Here, it’s thought of as a game, something fun to do but not really an athletic competition.”
The Washington Post did a good article about the top-ranked junior player in the United States. Ariel Hsing is only 12 years old but is one of the top young table tennis players in the world. She is competing this weekend in Philadelphia for a chance to represent the United States in the 2008 Olympics.
In between her commitments as a seventh-grader at Chaboya Middle School in San Jose, Hsing practices for three hours each day with a cadre of coaches and spends her summers training in China. Her parents invited a professional Chinese player to live with them in San Jose, where he functions as Hsing’s practice partner. They plan to replace him with another professional player soon — assuming they can find one capable of challenging Hsing.
Her career, remarkably, has exceeded even those initial expectations, convincing some in the table tennis community that Hsing is the most talented U.S. junior in decades. She won her first national title at 8 and accepted sponsorship from Butterfly — a major table tennis manufacturer — at 9. Bill Gates and Warren Buffett sent a private jet for Hsing in 2007 so she could play against investors during an annual meeting. She held court for three hours, never losing a game.
Here is video of Warren Buffet and Bill Gates playing Hsing earlier this year in Omaha, and here is a picture.
A sports writer at Drexel University wrote a column about his experience covering the Olympic Trials at his university.
When Drexel announced that they got the rights to the Table Tennis Olympic Trials this summer, I thought it was a fun joke. I had no idea that ping-pong was an Olympic sport.
My editor wanted to do extensive coverage of the four-day event, and I could not help but ask why. The most use I have ever gotten out of a ping-pong table was using it as a beer pong table. It has been so long since I have played the game that I was beginning to forget the real purpose of the table.
The 2008 U.S. Olympic team trials have begun at Drexel University in Philadelphia. The trials will help determine who will compete in the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China.
The official trials start Friday and the top four finishers in the men’s and women’s division will move on to the North American Trials in April in Vancouver, British Columbia. Team USA competes with Canada for the final Olympic spots.
There are three North American spots for both men and women available for the Olympics. All three men’s positions will be decided in Vancouver while only one more spot is open for the women. USA’s top-ranked women Jun Gao and Chen Wang are in the top 20 world rankings and earned an automatic spot in China.
Here is some local and national coverage of the event.
Table Tennis Cry: Who’s Got Next? - Associated Press
Olympic Hopefuls Battle During Table Tennis Trials At Drexel - NBC10.com
Opening Day of Round Robin at 2008 U.S. Olympic & National Team Trials Table Tennis Complete - DrexelDragons.com
Ping Pong Central has just become an authorized dealer of Killerspin. Killerspin is one of the up and coming brands in table tennis - and it’s based right here in the United States. Killerspin has a partnership with ESPN and its tables were even featured in a major motion picture - Balls of Fury.
We carry the complete line of Killerspin ping pong tables. You can find the list below.
Killerspin Alpha - $649.95
Killerspin Cyclone - $699.95
Killerspin Storm - $799.95
Killerspin Brute - $899.95
Killerspin True Blue - $949.95
Killerspin Thunder - $949.95
Killerspin Rad - $1549.95
Killerspin Revolution - $1999.95
In the near future, we will start carrying other great products by Killerspin (such as balls, blades, apparel, and more).
I’m pleased to announce that Ping Pong Central will now be carrying DHS ping pong tables, accessories, blades, and more.
DHS (also known as Double Happiness) is a one of the biggest and most respected table tennis brands in China. DHS equipment has been used at the past two Olympic games and will be used in the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.
You can view our full-line of DHS ping pong tables. We’ll be adding more products from this great company in the near future.
DHS Competition - $499.95
DHS Master Pro - $549.95
DHS Eurostar - $699.95
DHS Regent Compact - $829.95
DHS Supreme Pro - $999.95
DHS Expert Compact - $1099.95
DHS Rainbow - $1599.95