On Friday night, Ben and I were able to go out and decided to check out a pizza place in D.C. called Comet Ping Pong. When we arrived, it was obvious that something out of the ordinary was happening in the back of the restaurant where they keep ping pong tables for people to play on. A match was being taped and people were gathered around watching. The focus seemed to be on this interesting old man named Marty. We knew he must be someone important, but it wasn't until we got home and did some internet research that we discovered we had been in the presence of a ping pong legend.
It turns out that Marty Reisman is a 78 year old champion table tennis player. He was the 1958 and 1960 U.S. Men’s Singles Champion and the 1997 U.S. Hardbat Champion. I think the best description of this guy would be the title of his autobiography, The Money Player, The confessions of America's Greatest Table Tennis Player and Hustler.
We're not sure how he ended up in D.C. that night at this ping pong pizza place, but it was fate.
He performed his signature trick (which he has performed on Letterman), hitting a cigarette spot-on and breaking it in half:
Marty instructs the crowd.
Weird parallel - when I started the ping pong club in high school, we had a table and balls but no paddles, so we used pizza boxes for paddles the first meeting.
ReplyDeleteIncredible!! What is the name of the restaurant?
ReplyDeleteI just updated the post to include the name of the place, Comet Ping Pong. The pizza was quite delicious.
ReplyDelete