You know a sport has scored a comeback when People magazine takes a page away from its coverage of high-profile hookups and breakups to mention it as a new fitness trend and date-night activity.
Ping-pong has re-emerged, fueled in part by the likes of Susan Sarandon, who has opened the Manhattan club SPiN NYC, known as the "table tennis Taj Mahal." Facilities include standard tables, pro courts, a stadium court, pro shop, robotic ball machines and more.
A pro shop and ball machines. For table tennis. I might have been tempted to dismiss this as just a trendy uptick caused by the oncoming summer games in London (ping-pong has been an Olympic sport since 1988), until I was driving past a local community center and saw a sign proclaiming it was "Table Tennis Night."
I was hooked…just reel this fish right in. I love trying new things, particularly sports. And no matter how embarrassingly horrible I am at it, I'm happy because it's a new challenge. And make no mistake, I am an epically bad table tennis player. But that in no way detracts from the fun I can have. Particularly when, after I've sent the ball careening not just off the table but around the room, I can sit down and watch people play seriously. Then it's just plain jaw-dropping.
According to Michael Cavanaugh, CEO of USA Table Tennis, it's about time people started paying attention to the merits of what he calls "the ultimate basement sport." The USATT has about 9,000 registered members, but according to Cavanaugh, there are an estimated 23 million tables in homes. And, he adds, there's room for growth. A health or racquet sports club can put a ping-pong table in an unused area and create a social hub for members, and table tennis nights can make for fun programming.
It's also a natural for senior centers, retirement communities and assisted living facilities - a sport with portable and inexpensive equipment that can be implemented easily. It sharpens reflexes and alertness, as well as hand-eye coordination, and dovetails nicely with a study released last month by the American College of Sports Medicine that found that increased physical activity has the potential to decrease dementia-related death.
In any case, if you're in NYC anytime soon, and you want to visit Sarandon's club, you might just see the likes of Ed Norton or George Clooney, who Sarandon says are among the so-called 'pongeratti.' And don't turn your back on the city's public school kids when you're at the table either; Sarandon just kicked in a $75,000 grant to teach table tennis there, too.
