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Tulsan Hans Helmrich has been a sports fan all his life. So …
2 for the Gold Olympics challenge: Cayden plays "ping pong" with the Tulsa Table Tennis Club
Posted: 08/04/2012
TULSA - You know the game.
And you know the sound.
But you don't dare call it Ping Pong, especially when you're around the members of the Tulsa Table Tennis Club.
"Ping Pong is what you do at home. It's a recreational sport, just kind of for fun. Table Tennis - that's a sport. You gotta be trained for it. You gotta work out for it. You gotta have a coach. You gotta get your strokes right, your footwork. How to move in order to compete at the Olympic level, at the highest level," said club president Kelly Boyce.
These guys take this sport very seriously.
Check out behind the scenes photos from our 2 for the Gold shoots. On your phone? Use this link bit.ly/bigalphotos to see the pictures.
So, I gave it a shot. I was paired up with a guy named Alex. It should go without saying but, Alex is good. Very good.
He skunked me 11-0 in back to back games. But I finally got his number in the third game and scored my first point. Nobody scores 25 straight points against me!
In all seriousness though, despite how good Alex is, he said the players in London are even that much better than him.
"They could beat us 11-to-nothing. Any day. Just a whole different world. Even though we play a lot, even though we're pretty good, they're just that much better," said Alex.
After hanging out with these guys for one afternoon, all I can say is, this is definitely not Ping Pong!
Check out the video to see how I did. If you're reading this on your phone or iPad go to our Video section to watch me in action.
Also, don't forget to go to our Facebook page and vote for the event you'd like to see me or Big Al compete in.
Copyright 2012 Scripps Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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