Table Tennis Fail

My ping pong form is erratic to say the least.  I’m still playing almost 5 times a week, but day-to-day and shot-to-shot I am just too inconsistent.  I can pull off a spectacular winner on one play, and then the next just chunk an easy one into the net.  So very, very frustrating.  A couple of weeks ago I went through a 2-3 day stretch where I was unbeatable, and then Friday and today I wasn’t even capable of winning a single game.  It’s kind of got me down, not just ping pong but the fact that I’ve never really excelled at any sport.  I’ve tried sports like hockey, squash, tennis, badminton, even archery – but nope, useless.  A terrible sense of balance has definitely not helped – part of the reason I can’t skate, roller-blade, ski, golf or ballroom dance.  But the real issue is that I’ve never been particularly fit – I lack, and have always lacked, the strength and stamina to succeed at sports.  I can display the occasional glimpse of amazing skill, but all too rarely and certainly incapable of sustaining it.  This has got me reminiscing about my school days – where I was just too small, weak, unfit and unable to see without my glasses that meant that I was never going to succeed at the physical team sports like football and rugby.  I have a vague recollection of getting lapped in the 1500 meters in the House Athletics competition – how embarrassing for the young me already lacking courage and confidence (though I have other more positive sporting recollections e.g. of a stunning Jan Molby-esque pass in a football game that my PE teacher couldn’t believe was intentional, and a sustained sequence of wicket after wicket when bowling in the cricket nets).  I gravitated towards hockey, though I was never willing or able to step up to playing at university-level (though I’ve still got my newspaper clippings from when my name made it into the sports pages of the Hertfordshire Mercury playing for the Hertford 3rd or 4th hockey team!).  If only I was able to learn to skate, I think I could have made a really good ice hockey player – but alas that wasn’t to be.  So at my age now, here I am resigned to just playing ping pong and occasional other racket sports.  The competitive spirit in me has always been there (as perfectly exemplified by the frustration and stream of profanities emitted during my recent poor ping pong form), but the occasional flash of skill does not make up for the overwhelming sense of sporting mediocrity.  Sad face emoji.