Real athletes play…pingpong?

Friday, May 31, 1996

I’m tired of getting laughed at when I tell people that I play
ping pong competitively. Contrary to popular belief, ping pong is a
sport, and I am an athlete.

People don’t realize the pain and the agony that I go through
every off-season. I run five-miles a day, four times a week, in
order to build up my stamina. It’s not easy playing an entire
pingpong match, having to run up and down the side of a table. Half
of my wins are a product of out-lasting my opponent. After running,
I lift weights, giving me the leg strength to stand upright for
half-an-hour and the arm strength to hit a near-weightless ball
with a four-ounce paddle. After every match, I spend hours in the
training room, with an ice pack on every one of my worn down
muscles. I’m the human freezer.

Last season, I suffered a major hand injury by cutting myself on
the corner of the table, after I tried to stab at a forehand
crosscourt shot by my opponent. I had to bandage my cut, gut it
out, and play through my injury, like a true warrior.

The pain got so bad that I just told the doctor, "shoot me up!"
And he did. 18 doses of Vicadin and I was back out in the rec
room.

My competitiveness led to an addiction to Vicadin. But I just
couldn’t resist. The pressure from my peers would have been just
too great. Unequivocally, pingpong players are the toughest species
around.

So don’t tell me that I’m not an athlete. pingpong is a medal
event at the Summer Olympics. Telling me that pingpong is not a
sport is like telling me synchronized swimming is not a sport, that
badminton is not a sport, that ballroom dancing is not a sport,
that yachting is not a sport, that shooting is not a sport, that
modern pentathlon is not a sport, that equestrian events are not
sports and that archery is not a sport. If things go right, darts
will finally become a medal event, and rightfully so.

I have a hunch as to why we don’t get the respect that we
deserve. It’s jealousy. People see how athletically-gifted we have
to be in order to play pingpong competitively. They see the
God-given ability that they don’t have, so they try to bring us
down to their level.

Pingpong players are athletes. There’s no way to spin it. And
pingpong is a sport, and a damn exciting one at that.