Interesting Table Tennis Facts

 

Table tennis was introduced to the Seoul Summer Olympics in 1988 and has since become a mainstay of the four-year competition. Table tennis, one of the most thrilling sporting spectacles, is a game of intense speed and jaw-dropping perfection. The game was first known as ping pong before being renamed to table tennis in 1922. It was originally a pastime for the affluent in Victorian-era England. Europeans, particularly Hungarians, played and dominated the sport in its early years.

 

However, after making its way to the continent in the 1950s, table tennis gained enormous popularity in Asia, where it has since served as a breeding ground for some of the top players in the world. Table tennis debuted at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, just eight years after China hosted its first World Cup, and has since become a regular event at the Games. Let's learn some more interesting facts about this wonderful game.

 

Interesting facts about table tennis

 

●      The table tennis court

 

According to the game's official rules, table tennis balls is played on a rectangular table made of fibre wood that is 2.74 × 1.53 metres and is divided into two halves. A net that divides the table into two parts is suspended from the table using two poles. The height of the table tennis net is 15.25 centimetres.

 

●      Racquet for table tennis

 

The bat, also known as a "racquet" or "paddle," is often made of wood and measures around 17 cm long by 15 cm wide. It has rubber surfaces in the colours black and red on either side that aid players in adding and subtracting spin to the ball.

 

●      ping pong ball

 

According to rules and regulations, the ball is normally orange or white, weighs around 2.7 grams, and has a 40 millimetre diameter.

 

●      Health  and fitness

 

Table tennis is a game that you can play for the rest of your life if you play it recreationally and get some fitness. You can compete against people who are male or female, young or elderly, able-bodied or crippled. If two players in a table tennis competition are in the same rating group, an 80-year-old man may compete against an 8-year-old girl.

 

●      Brain, body and mind

 

Playing table tennis has several advantages. On KQED, CBS, and other news networks, it has been referred to as the best cerebral sport. More areas of the brain are reportedly activated by table tennis than any other sport, according to study. To help senior patients fight mental illnesses like Alzheimer's and dementia, doctors have suggested playing table tennis. Table tennis has many advantages, including keeping the brain young. Exercise keeps the body young.

 

●      The patent

 

The Parker Brothers first obtained a patent for "ping pong," another term for table tennis. However, Escalade Sports now owns it. Table tennis used to be played for 21 points until the revisions in 2000; presently, it only awards 11 points.

 

●      China

 

The American table tennis group visited China in 1971, when China and the United States didn't have any diplomatic ties. The newspapers and media in general in the United States referred to that as "Ping Pong Diplomacy."

 

●      Trademark

 

●      The game was officially trademarked by a skilled businessman

 

James Devonshire, an Englishman, was the first to attempt to patent the indoor game, according to the International Table Tennis Federation. Although Devonshire, who applied for the invention in 1885, termed it "table tennis," documents show that he abandoned it by 1887. According to other accounts, the oldest surviving table tennis set was patented in 1890 by an Englishman by the name of David Foster.