The Australian Education Reporter
Table tennis
In The classroom
“she’s actually won every TITLE That’s possible for a junior and she’s by far The most successful junior female west australian Table Tennis player In history.”
WHILE table tennis is widely played socially, it remains a fringe sport for serious players in Australia.
Table Tennis Western Australia (TTWA) coaching director Alvin Jiang believes that the sport is growing in popularity.
“We have a federally funded school program throughout Australia for primary schools,” Mr Jiang said.
“Generally we go after school or our workshops are incorporated into the PE class.”
Mr Jiang said more children and young people should play table tennis because it increases reflexes, hand-eye coordination and has even been “scientifically proven to decrease the risk of Alzheimer’s” in the older generation.
The veteran’s league, which consists of athletes ages between 30 and 80 years plus, remains popular. The National Veterans Championship held in Mandurah, WA in October, is expected to attract more than 400 participants.
TTWA tournament director Peter Mascall said that players often continue in the sport for their whole lifetime.
“Once children are a bit older they come back and teach the kids and get them involved, it’s a family sport,” he said.
That’s certainly the case for Carl Nicolas, a social player whose wife Ruth bought a table for recreation and family games.
To his surprise his daughter Holly showed incredible coordination and agility at the age of nine and within 18 months of technical training she was on the State Squad.
Holly Nicolas is the current under 18 Oceania Champion and recently won gold in the National Under 18 Girl’s Singles and Team events in Hobart.
“When she was 13 she won the under 13’s State championships, so we put her in the under 15s, the age group above her, and she also won that,” Mr Nicolas said.
“So we put her in the under 18s just to give her experience and she won that. So we put her in the under 21s and she won that at the age of 13.
“It was the first time an athlete had won every age group in the same year at age 13 in the history of WA since 1936.”
An outstanding achievement in perfect health, but Holly’s wins are even more impressive considering the fact she has cystic fibrosis.
“With her health issues it’s always a challenge just keeping healthy, keeping on top of it and doing plenty of exercise,” Mr Nicolas said.
“She gets up at five in the morning three times a week and goes to the gym and then goes to school.”
Mr Nicolas credited Holly’s success to a different structure of training that has made her an all-round flexible player than can adapt to any style.
“Holly trains against a chopper and pimple player, fast top spin player and a traditional player, covering the main styles that she’ll come up against,” he said.
“It’s all about mental attitude as well. She doesn’t do the volume of training some of the other kids do but the training that she does do is very high-quality and that’s bridged the gap.”
This year at the Oceania Championships in Fiji, Holly won gold in all four events, Singles, Team, Doubles and Mixed Doubles.
“She’s actually won every title that’s possible for a junior and she’s by far the most successful junior female West Australian table tennis player in history,” Mr Nicolas said.
Holly has been selected for the Commonwealth Games play off in January and is the number one Australian seed for the World Junior Championships in Italy in December. While table tennis is unfunded in Australia, Holly has the 2020 Olympics in her sights.
“The problem now that Holly is breaking into the top women’s league, Commonwealth Games, Olympics, is that she needs lots of funding,” Mr Nicolas said.
“Our next big challenge is to find money to get her a high level coach to work with every day.”
Since 2015, Holly has played about 160 top flight junior matches, only losing five or six.
Mr Nicolas says Holly is an inspiration and loves to go to schools to do demonstrations and get more children and young people involved in the sport.
“She’s an amazing character and we are very proud of her,” he said.
“she gets up at five In The morning Three Times a week and goes To The gym and Then goes To school .”