Ping pong makes a comeback; Paralympic sport becoming more popular with everyone

From The Dallas Morning News. In the picture, Adam Moussa plays Don Isgitt .

The year 2009 has seen its fair share of comebacks: Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler, the "scrunchie" in the hair of actress Evangeline Lilly, Eminem with his new album, Relapse and ... pingpong?

The scaled-down, indoor cousin of tennis has been resurrected from dingy storage rooms across the country. And like any noteworthy comeback, it has returned with a new, sophisticated edge. Susan Sarandon is launching a pingpong bar, SPiN New York, in New York City later this month. Bud Light is sponsoring a Las Vegas Ping-Pong tournament that will run on ESPN.

Pingpong has also emerged from obscurity in less glamorous circles, evidenced in the rising member numbers of table tennis organizations.

Many pingpong professionals say its recent success can, along with celebrity interest, be largely attributed to two factors: the 2008 Beijing Olympics, which helped to reintroduce pingpong to the mainstream public, and the poor economy. As people look for cheap entertainment inside the home, they rediscover the low-maintenance family sport.

"It's an inexpensive game to play," said Michael Cavanaugh, chief executive officer of USA Table Tennis, a national players' organization. "To me, [its popularity] is inverse to the economy at this point."

His group has gained 1,000 new members in the past 18 months. Similarly, Doru Gheorghe, the organization's high-performance director and the U.S. women's Olympic coach, said he has seen a rise in the number of national pingpong clubs.

"It's a family game," he said. "You know, you cannot wrestle your father. But you can beat your father in table tennis."

Daniel Rutenberg, vice president of Dallas Fort Worth Table Tennis, said the number of players participating in the group's annual tournaments has increased by 40 percent within the past year.

"It's becoming less of, for lack of better term, a secondary sport," said Rutenberg, who also coaches the Paralympic table tennis team – designed for those with physical disabilities. "We've had over 100 players coming to our tournaments, and that number is typically in the 60s."

The local organization recently held its spring tournament at the Dallas Jewish Community Center. Pros, beginners, young and old faced off – some playing for fun, others for the fierce competition.

A group of six employees from McKinney-based Web design company lifeBLUE Media were tournament newcomers, who said they play at their office.

"It's definitely a good stress reliever," said 24-year-old Shauna Kamer, who described her team as "Web designers with an edge." Jourdan Wilkerson, a fellow 24-year-old lifeBLUE associate, added, "During work it's fun, relaxing, and it gets your blood pumping."

Mike Godfrey, a 44-year-old who raises bucking bulls, came to play from his home in Dublin, Texas. He trained with pingpong pros when he was 21 and rediscovered his love for the sport after breaking his neck in a 1996 rodeo accident. Godfrey, who uses a wheelchair, is now training for the 2012 Paralympics.

"When I was rodeoing, people would ask me, 'What if you break your neck?' " he said. "I told them, 'Well, I'll just play wheelchair sports.' " And unlike other sports, pingpong comes with an additional perk: "Air conditioning," he said. "I get too hot outside."

Katherine Wu, account executive for Joola, a global distributor of pingpong equipment and official equipment sponsor for Susan Sarandon's bar, said the sport offers a unique mix of speed and leisure. While players can engage in competitive volley, it can also be played at a more relaxed pace.

"You can have a conversation while playing," she said. "You can't from across the tennis court."

Tom Nguyen, marketing associate at Joola, said that SPiN New York is the brainchild of Sarandon and three documentary film directors who held pingpong gatherings in their New York City loft apartment. They met Sarandon when she attended one of their parties, which Nguyen said were commonly frequented by celebrities.

"They're three relatively young guys who just fell in love with pingpong," he said. "They love the social aspect of it."

But for pingpong to remain at the forefront of popular culture, Rutenberg said it needs to be viewed as a more serious sport. Although pingpong faces the challenge of overcoming its reputation as a trivial pastime, Rutenberg said the local competitive table tennis scene is growing. Texas Wesleyan University in Fort Worth boasts an impressive team, which is ranked No. 1 by The National Collegiate Table Tennis Association.

"What immediately jumps to mind is basement, recreation," he said. "But table tennis can be compared to any other Olympic sport. It's a very comprehensive, cardiovascular sport."