Ping Pong and Pool: One Table
Ping pong is not our exclusive contention. My first cousin and I were always competitive… maybe too competitive. It might be as trivial as who might eat speedier or just plain consume a higher quantity… who could consume food slower or less. It didn’t matter. If there was a way one mortal could best the other in something, we’d contend.
Unfortunately, the small abode my wife and I bought does not have a ton of space for the many ways my first cousin and I wish to compete. After much deliberation, my wife and I finally settled on a billiard table with a table tennis conversion top. Essentially this affords us the ability to enjoy either pool or table tennis on a single table in the same space.
So now our infamous competition continues. Of course, he incessantly kvetches that it isn’t the real thing. Even though he usually bests me in pool, every single time we place the table tennis conversion top upon the pool table, it seems his game drifts.
To put it plainly, I think it’s because I’m just plain the greater ping-pong player. But regrettably, he possesses too numerous excuses. The elevation isn’t correct. The proportions are incorrect. The list proceeds on. Thus I procured the measuring tape. The height and proportions are spot on to the official table tennis dimensions. Then he claimed the table had the incorrect bounce; that somehow the billiard table beneath affected the velocity and elevation of the bounce.
So we researched the official bounce measurement (indeed, there is an official bounce measurement). It’s for each 30 centimeters of drop, there should be a 23 centimeters bounce. We tested the bounce in over a dozen locations on the conversion top. In each spot the ball bounced virtually perfectly straight up and almost exactly 23 centimeters high. So you realize, ping pong conversion tops do a perfectly respectable job replicating a good game of table tennis. And my cousin has no excuses. I am simply the greater table tennis player.