60 Fun Facts About Ping Pong

Since the 2000 rule change, what is the diameter of a regulation ball?

The regulation ball has measured 40 mm in diameter since October 2000; the larger ball meets more air resistance, which slowed rallies to make the sport easier to follow on television.

A game is won by the first player to reach how many points, provided they lead by two?

A game goes to 11 points and must be won by two; the ITTF adopted the 11-point game on 1 September 2001 to make matches shorter and more television-friendly.

During a game, how often does the serve switch between opponents?

Service changes after every two points; once both players reach 10, the serve alternates after every single point until someone leads by two.

When serving, the ball must be tossed straight up at least how far before it is struck?

The ball must rise at least 16 cm after leaving the server's open, flat palm, tossed near-vertically and without spin so the receiver and umpire can see it.

How long is a regulation table?

A regulation table is 9 ft (2.74 m) long, 5 ft (1.525 m) wide and 76 cm (2.5 ft) high, with a uniformly dark, matte playing surface.

How high is the net?

The top of the net stands 6 in (15.25 cm) above the playing surface, and the net also projects 15.25 cm beyond each side line of the table.

How much does a regulation ball weigh?

The ITTF specifies a ball mass of 2.7 g; each approved ball is also tested for roundness, hardness and bounce, and must be white or orange with a matte finish.

Under ITTF rules, one side of the paddle's rubber must always be which colour?

One side of the rubber must be black; the other side was red-only until October 2021, when blue, green, pink and violet were also allowed, so opponents can tell which rubber struck the ball.

Which British manufacturer trademarked the name 'ping-pong' in 1901?

The name was already in wide use; after the trademark it came to mean the game played with Jaques's pricey equipment, and everyone else said 'table tennis'.

Which US game company bought the 'ping-pong' name and enforced the trademark in the 1920s?

Parker Brothers held the US rights to the name 'Ping-Pong' and enforced them in the 1920s, forcing American associations to call the sport 'table tennis' instead.

In the game's Victorian beginnings, what stood in a row along the table to serve as a net?

Two more books were the rackets and the ball was a golf ball; the game is thought to have come home with British officers serving in India.

Celluloid balls came into the game after enthusiast James W. Gibb found novelty balls on a 1901 trip to which country?

The same year E. C. Goode invented the modern racket by gluing pimpled rubber to a wooden blade, and an unofficial world championship followed in 1902.

Since 2015, official balls have been made of what instead of celluloid?

The ITTF's 'poly ball', made of a plastic polymer rather than flammable celluloid, became standard at its events from July 2014; balls are white or orange with a matte finish.

In 1901, E. C. Goode created the modern paddle by fixing what to the wooden blade?

Goode fixed a sheet of pimpled rubber to the wooden blade in 1901; a sponge layer beneath the rubber followed in the 1950s and transformed spin and speed again.

The first official World Championships, in 1926, were held in which city?

The first World Championships were held in London in December 1926, the year the ITTF was founded; Roland Jacobi and Maria Mednyanszky took the inaugural singles titles.

By ITTF rule, at least what share of a paddle blade's thickness must be natural wood?

At least 85% of the blade's thickness must be natural wood; the rest may be reinforcing layers such as carbon fibre, glass fibre or Kevlar, each no thicker than 7.5% of the blade or 0.35 mm.

What does the ITTF rulebook call the bat or paddle?

The ITTF rulebook calls it a racket; the wooden part alone is the blade, usually one to seven plies, and the rules allow a racket of any size, shape or weight.

Which grip, traditional in China and Japan, points the blade downward from the hand?

It is popular in China, Japan and Korea; Chinese players developed the reverse penhold backhand in the 1990s to fix the grip's weak side.

Yoo Nam-kyu, the first Olympic men's singles champion in table tennis, represented which country?

Yoo Nam-kyu won the inaugural Olympic men's singles for South Korea, beating compatriot Kim Ki-taik in an all-Korean final, and added a bronze in the doubles at the same Games.

Table tennis became an Olympic sport at which Games?

Table tennis made its Olympic debut at Seoul 1988 with men's and women's singles and doubles; the host nation and China won two gold medals each.

At the 2008 Beijing Olympics, what replaced the men's and women's doubles?

Team competitions replaced the doubles at Beijing 2008; China swept all six singles medals there, prompting a limit of two singles entries per nation from 2012.

Mixed doubles joined the Olympic table tennis programme at which Games?

Mixed doubles debuted at Tokyo 2020, where Japan's Jun Mizutani and Mima Ito beat China's Xu Xin and Liu Shiwen in the final.

Jan-Ove Waldner, 'the Mozart of table tennis', won 1992 Olympic singles gold for which country?

Waldner won the Barcelona 1992 singles for Sweden, beating France's Jean-Philippe Gatien in the final; he also took the world singles title in 1989 and 1997.

Because of his extraordinary longevity, Waldner is known in China by what nickname?

Chinese fans call Waldner 'the Evergreen Tree' (Chang Qing Shu) for a top-level career stretching from the early 1980s into his forties; in the 1990s he was reportedly better known in China than Bill Clinton.

Which Chinese player is the only table tennis athlete with six Olympic gold medals?

Ma Long won six Olympic golds at every Games from 2012 to 2024, in singles and team events; the ITTF nicknamed him 'The Dragon' because his given name means dragon.

A table tennis 'Grand Slam' means singles titles at the Worlds, the World Cup and which other event?

The Grand Slam pairs the World Championships and World Cup with singles gold at the Olympic Games; Jan-Ove Waldner was the first to complete it, at Barcelona in 1992.

Which player completed the career Grand Slam in a record 445 days, ending in 2012?

Zhang Jike took the 2011 World Championship in Rotterdam, the 2011 World Cup in Paris, then 2012 Olympic gold, completing the Grand Slam in 445 days as the fourth man to do so.

Paris 2024 men's singles champion Fan Zhendong is affectionately known by what nickname?

Fan Zhendong is called 'Little Fatty' (Xiao Pang) for his stocky build; he won the world singles title in 2021 and 2023 before his Paris gold completed his set of major crowns.

Why was future four-time Olympic champion Deng Yaping initially kept off China's national team?

At 1.5 metres tall she was thought too small, then won 18 world titles and retired at 24 as the most decorated player in the sport.

Angelica Rozeanu, who won six consecutive women's world singles titles, played for which country?

Rozeanu, a Jewish player from Bucharest, was barred from sports halls under Romania's wartime racial laws from 1940 to 1944, then won the world singles title every year from 1950 to 1955.

Viktor Barna, a record five-time men's world singles champion in the 1930s, was born in which country?

Barna was born Gyozo Braun in Budapest, Hungary, in 1911; he won his five world singles titles between 1930 and 1935 before settling in England.

The Swaythling Cup was donated in 1926 by the mother of which first ITTF president?

Montagu, an aristocrat's son, was also a film critic and producer who worked with Alfred Hitchcock.

Which future Wimbledon champion won the men's singles world table tennis title in Budapest in 1929?

Fred Perry won the 1929 world title in Budapest before his three Wimbledon singles titles (1934-36); the St. Bride Vase, the men's singles trophy, was donated by a St. Bride club member to mark his win.

The Corbillon Cup, the original women's team trophy, vanished in the occupation of which city?

The original cup, held by the 1939 winners, disappeared from Berlin during the city's occupation in 1945; the trophy awarded since is a replica made in 1949.

Ping-pong diplomacy began when Glenn Cowan boarded the Chinese team's bus at the 1971 World Championships in which city?

At the 1971 Worlds in Nagoya, Japan, Cowan missed his own team's bus after a late practice session and climbed aboard the Chinese bus; two days after the photographs ran, the US team was invited to China.

What gift did Chinese champion Zhuang Zedong hand Glenn Cowan on that bus?

Zhuang passed over the badges, handkerchiefs and fans in his bag and gave Cowan a silk portrait of mountains, a brocade of the Huangshan range; Cowan could only offer a comb, then later a peace-sign T-shirt.

The 1971 exchange of players paved the way for which US president's landmark 1972 visit to China?

Richard Nixon's February 1972 trip was the first visit by a sitting US president to mainland China and ended with the Shanghai Communique.

Who became China's first world champion in any sport by winning the 1959 men's singles?

Rong Guotuan won the 1959 men's singles in Dortmund, becoming China's first world champion in any sport; his win launched the country's long table tennis dynasty.

In which 1994 film does the title character become a ping-pong celebrity playing against Chinese teams?

Forrest Gump learns the game while recovering from a war wound, tours China with the US team, and later funds his shrimp boat with a paddle-endorsement cheque.

Which actor co-starred with Dan Fogler in the 2007 ping-pong comedy Balls of Fury?

Christopher Walken plays the villain Feng, a ping-pong-obsessed crime lord, opposite Dan Fogler's Randy Daytona; Thomas Lennon co-wrote the film and appears as German player Karl Wolfschtagg.

The 1972 arcade game Pong was created by Allan Alcorn as a training exercise at which company?

Bushnell assigned Pong to Alcorn as a training exercise at Atari, which he had co-founded with Ted Dabney in 1972; the result became the first commercially successful video game.

Pong's concept was based on a ping-pong game included with which pioneering home console?

Bushnell had played the Magnavox Odyssey's table tennis game at a May 1972 demonstration in Burlingame, California; Magnavox later sued over the patents and settled for licence fees.

In 1975, the home version of Pong was sold exclusively through which retailer?

Sears sold Home Pong under its Tele-Games label for Christmas 1975 after its sporting-goods buyer ordered 150,000 units; the console's success spawned a wave of clones.

Table tennis's 'expedite system' starts if a game is unfinished after how long, with under 18 points scored?

Expedite begins if a game is unfinished after 10 minutes' play unless both players have scored at least 9 points; once in force, each player serves one point in turn for the rest of the match.

Under the expedite system, the receiver wins the point after how many consecutive returns?

Once expedite is in force, the receiver scores if they make 13 good returns in a rally, which forces the server to attack rather than push endlessly; defensive choppers dislike the rule.

Roughly what share of table tennis players at the 2016 Olympics were naturalised citizens?

About 31% of the table tennis players at Rio 2016 were naturalised citizens, roughly double the rate in any other sport there, and the ITTF later tightened its eligibility rules.

Chinese-born Feng Tianwei, who won three Olympic table tennis medals, represented which country?

Feng moved from Harbin to Singapore in 2007 under its foreign-talent scheme and won team silver at the 2008 Olympics, then singles and team bronzes in 2012.

In 2003 the ITTF moved its headquarters to Lausanne from which English seaside town?

The ITTF moved from Hastings, on the East Sussex coast, to Lausanne, home of the IOC, in 2003; its museum opened there the same year before transferring to Shanghai in 2018.

Timo Boll, world No. 1 in 2003, 2011 and 2018, played for which country?

Timo Boll, born in Erbach in the German state of Hesse, won the European singles title eight times and led Germany to team silver at the 2008 Olympics.

Which substance, applied beneath rubbers from the mid-1980s, was banned by the ITTF in 2008?

Speed glue's volatile solvents made the sponge swell and spring, adding speed and spin; the ITTF banned glues containing harmful volatile compounds from September 2008.

The 'World Championship of Ping Pong' requires wooden paddles covered with what?

The event uses plain wooden bats faced with sandpaper, so spin is minimal; 'hardbat', the related variant with short pips and no sponge, similarly strips out most of the modern game's spin.

Which attacking stroke brushes the ball to produce heavy topspin?

The loop brushes up the back of the ball to impart heavy topspin, which makes the ball dip onto the table; it is the main attacking stroke of modern play.

Richard Bergmann, world singles champion in 1937 and again post-war, was born in which country?

Bergmann was born in Vienna and won the 1937 world title for Austria at 17; after fleeing the Anschluss he took more titles for England in 1939, 1948 and 1950.

Roughly how many member associations did the ITTF have in the early 2020s?

The ITTF had about 226 member associations by 2020, one of the largest memberships of any sports federation; founded in 1926, it publishes the handbook that sets the official rules.

In doubles, a serve must bounce in which part of the receiver's court?

In doubles the serve must go diagonally: the ball bounces first in the server's right half-court, then in the receiver's right half-court, and partners alternate strokes thereafter.

What is the maximum total thickness allowed for a sponge-backed rubber covering?

ITTF rules cap a sandwich rubber at 4 mm total thickness including sponge and adhesive, and a plain pips-only covering at 2 mm.

A regulation ball dropped from 30 cm onto the table must bounce to roughly what height?

ITTF rule 2.1.3 requires the playing surface to give a uniform bounce of about 23 cm when a standard ball is dropped onto it from 30 cm, roughly 77 percent of the drop height.

What is the minimum height clearance required for an ITTF-regulation playing space?

ITTF rule 3.2.3 requires a playing space at least 14 metres long, 7 metres wide and 5 metres high; wheelchair events may use a reduced area of at least 8 by 6 metres.

Which journalist noted in Red Star Over China that the Communist forces had a 'bizarre' passion for table tennis?

Edgar Snow, the American journalist who interviewed Mao in 1936, remarked in Red Star Over China that the Communist forces had a 'bizarre' passion for the English game of table tennis.

Which spin has its axis roughly parallel to the ball's path, making it dart sideways on the bounce?

Corkspin, also called drill-spin, rotates the ball around its direction of travel, so the Magnus effect barely bends its flight but the ball kicks sideways on the bounce; it is used almost only on serves.