If there were one place where everyone is on an equal playing field, it would likely be in the sport of table tennis. The sport welcomes players of all ages, genders and abilities, and is very easy to pick up. With a strong player base in the younger and older generations, table tennis, or “ping pong,” is becoming increasingly popular in many communities.

A short car ride from Gunn will take you to the Palo Alto Table Tennis Club, a private organization located at the Cubberley Community Center. The club meets on Tuesdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. It is open to the public for a $7 entry fee, but more serious players can pay $300 for a year membership.

Junior Joe Wu attends the club regularly on weekends, in addition to his own personal training. On average, he practices about five hours per week, including those spent at the club under instruction. According to Wu, the club is the best place to play. “There’s always a steady stream of opponents of decent skill level, and varying play styles,” he said. “Everyone’s pretty affable and during junior training, you get coaching,” Wu said. Junior training is meant to prepare young adults for national competitions every May.

According to Wu, it isn’t uncommon to see unlikely matches at the club. “Sometimes you have these 10-year-old girls who’ll beat 18-year-old guys,” he said. “Ball placement is much more important than strength.” In addition to classic battle-of-the-sexes, it is common to see players as young as ten rallying with grandparents well into their 80s.

If you ask Wu, he’ll tell you that table tennis is more than just pure competition. Similar to games such as chess, table tennis requires mental focus and determination. “It’s a mental battle,” Wu said. “You have to know how someone will serve, or where and how fast you should return it.”

The most attractive aspect of the sport to Wu, however, is its inclusiveness. There is rarely a player turned away and anyone can pick up a paddle and try the game out. “Ping pong isn’t an exclusionary sport like football or basketball, and the learning curve is really low,” Wu said.

—Noah Johnson

Team sports are all the rage recently. The NBA, SuperBowl and others pump many Americans’ heart during discussions. However, martial arts has been gaining recognition, seen quite often in Hollywood films.

The most popular styles of martial arts among Gunn students are karate, from Japan, and Taekwondo from Korea. “Taekwondo is a style more centered around your feet,” junior Michael Vogel said. “The goal is to repeal instead of attack.” Vogel, who has been practicing Taekwondo for nine years, is a black belt and an instructor at Cubberly Community Center.

Hoping to find a way to get in shape and remain active, Vogel chose to train in Taekwondo and soon fell in love with the sport. Taekwondo was developed by Korean farmers during the hostile Japanese occupation from 1910 to 1945 in order to protect themselves. “There’s less stress on competing, but more on the question ‘what can I do to make myself better or stronger?’” Vogel said.

For sophomore Helen Strnad, who trains in karate, martial arts is a way to defend herself. “It was my dad’s idea that I should learn how to protect myself,” Strnad said. “We practice the movement over and over so that they tone our natural fighting instincts, and so in a fight our instincts become more effective.” Strnad, like Vogel, said that training in the martial arts really helps her stay in shape, “It’s like yoga--a lot of aerobic exercises that get you strong and gain a lot of muscle control,” she said.

While martial arts are known as a sport of attack and defense, to Strnad, karate is also similar to a dance. “It’s just like a dance, only a very powerful one,” she said. “We practice katas, which are a series of punches and kicks that look like a dance.”

That is not to say that Strnad does not recognize Karate’s potential power and damage. “I saw our main instructor sparring with a lower instructor once, just throwing him, flipping him and make him do somersaults all over the place and [the lower instructor] couldn’t do anything to stop him.”

Martial arts is no longer a distant idea only seen in Jackie Chan movies, but a sport that can be practiced by those who choose to. With hard work and commitment, martial arts students are able to turn themselves into modern day Kung Fu masters.

—Bauer Wann

The Squash Club, previously an informal Facebook group, recently expanded to become a school-wide activity. Members are both enthusiastic and anxious about the changes that will soon be underway.

Cyrus Varza (‘07) and senior Vice President Jacob Savage formed the club years ago. “We just started playing and it’s a great sport,” Savage said.

The Squash Club grew gradually, mostly by word of mouth. “I didn’t really know what squash was at first but after I came here it was really fun, so I just kept returning,” junior member Sera Boerger said.

The appeal of the squash, many members said, is its fast pace. “It’s really intense,” current junior Club President Sasha Guttentag said. “It gives you such a good workout! Also, I like the fact that it’s indoors, so rain or shine you can play.”

Savage agreed. “You get a lot more exercise in squash than you do in tennis,” he said. “Apparently it’s the second-best cardiovascular workout. The first is cross-country skiing.”

Other members praised the club’s atmosphere. “I really like the group we have right now,” junior member Susha Roy said. “We’re really good friends.” Junior member Sera Boerger also noticed the group’s closeness. “It’s really tight-knit with everybody being friends with each other,” she said. This may be because squash appeals to those of different experience levels. “You can have a lot of fun with two people of different skills,” Savage said.

Boerger is unconcerned about having more players join the group. “As we get new members it might change but I think we’ll still have fun.”

Racquetball is played one-on-one, like many other court sports, with a small rubber ball and a racquet similar to a tennis racquet. What makes it unusual, however, is that the court’s walls, floor and ceiling are all legal playing surface, rather than being out of bounds.

Intermediate and advanced racquetball players can play weekly in Daly City with Bay Area Racquetball. Amateurs or players just looking for a good workout can find courts at The Club of Mountain View, the Palo Alto YMCA on Page Mill, or Supreme Court I in Sunnyvale.

—Aurelle Amram and Emily Glider