What Age to Start Playing Table Tennis by Roger Dickson

Jena Newgarden
As the head coach at the Newgy Table Tennis Center, I get this question quite often. There really is not a simple answer as the motor skills of all children develop differently. In China they may test motor skills for sports as young as five years old!

Under Age Eight

My general rule of thumb is to introduce some basic racket skills and have a lot of fun for the younger ages. Remember that the attention span is very short with younger players, so short and simple instructions are very important.

Using the Newgy Robo-Pong table tennis robot is actually quite good as the ball can be adjusted to bounce twice in front of the player with good depth and height. Control the racket for the student when you first start until they can maintain the position by themselves to simply block the ball back over the net. This is just basic racket/ball control and will help them gain confidence. If you have a group of kids, using the Pong-Master with your Newgy Robo-Pong will allow them to compete against the machine and each other!

Eight to Ten Years Old

Starting to learn table tennis in this age range, the players will start to be able to do more active programs with footwork and racket position changes very quickly. Some of the first pre-programmed drills on the Newgy Robo-Pong 2050/1050were thought of with this age group in mind. Just add time to the WAIT ADJUSTMENT to give the kids a chance to learn the drills and speed them up to challenge them as them reach an 80% success rate.

Table tennis is a great cross training sport for all sports, so you can’t really start too young or too old!

Roger Dickson

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