(by Steve Hopkins) Fan Zhendong, Ma Long, Harimoto, Calderano, Ovtcharov and a long list of championship hopefuls are converging in Weihai this Friday.  The table tennis world has waited 8 months to see those players in competition.  The second of the ITTF RESTART events, the Dishang 2020 ITTF Men’s World Cup is here. Twenty one […]

(by Steve Hopkins, photo from ITTFWorld) Table tennis is officially back.  The first of the ITTF Restart events has ended as the Dishang 2020 ITTF Women’s World Cup concluded on Tuesday. Chen Meng defeated Sun Yingsha in the final 4-1, a victory of World No. 1 over World No. 3. The two Chinese players were […]

(by Steve Hopkins, photo from ITTFWorld) Lily Zhang’s Run at the Dishang 2020 ITTF Women’s World Cup ended on Monday afternoon (local time).  Lily had a great tournament – in fact, both Jennifer Wu and Lily Zhang had great tournaments. The U.S. had two players participating and both advanced out of the Group Stage.  In […]

(by Steve Hopkins, photo ITTFWorld) Update 2: Jennifer Wu was on fire from the first point.  Playing the top seed in her group, World No. 20 Petrissa Solja (GER), Jennifer won 11-5, then 11-4, and then in a closer third game pulled out an 11-7 win.  Jennifer dominated every aspect of the game, placing short […]

(by Steve Hopkins, photo ITTFWorld) After 8 months of waiting, the ITTF Tour is back this weekend.  The Dishang 2020 ITTF Women’s World Cup, the first of the three ITTF RESTART events gets under way on Sunday.  Twenty one of the world’s best women players are emerging from an isolation period (to minimize potential COVID […]

(by Steve Hopkins) With the German Budesliga’s new season underway, many Americans have been following USA’s top player, Kanak Jha, who has joined one of that league’s top teams, TTF Liebherr Ochsenhausen. Ochsenhausen has been a top 3 team in Germany for several years – and currently includes Hugo Calderano and Simon Gauzy.  Ochsenhausen won […]

(by Steve Hopkins) The PongNow interview series discusses table tennis with some of the best players and personalities in the sport. PongNow is an interview series talking table tennis with some of the best players and personalities in the sport. The guest this week is Jörg Bitzigeio, former head coach of the German National Women’s […]

(by Steve Hopkins) USA Table Tennis has lost a legend.  George Braithwaite excelled in Cricket and Track and Field before starting his career in Table Tennis.  In our sport, George was a part of the U.S. Team the launched Ping Pong Diplomacy from the World Championships in Japan. His list of table tennis accomplishments included […]

(by Steve Hopkins, photo by ITTFWorld) NASA coined the term “T-Minus” for space launches with the “T” indicating “Time” as the countdown proceeded.  Many of their iconic broadcasts include statements from Launch Control indicating that all systems are “go” before changing over from a countdown of minutes into the final countdown of seconds.  The momentous […]