The Sangamon Table Tennis Club meets every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday night from 6:00pm to 10:00pm at Douglas Avenue United Methodist Church. 501 South Douglas Avenue, Springfield, IL (view map). (At the SW corner of Douglas & Governor. Parking is on the South side of the church; go down the outside steps and you'll see us through the windows.)

For more information about the club, please contact club President Rick Goertz through the Contact Us page.

• On most nights we usually have an open play format using the challenge system, though a table or two may be reserved for drill practice.
• Place your paddle under a table to challenge the winner of the current match. The winner must accept your challenge. Table winners also have the option to give up their table if they have won several matches in a row, or if there are no current challengers.
• During play, call a let if a ball from another table interrupts play or otherwise interferes with either player.
• We play according to the USATT rules (See also the ITTF Handbook).
• Games are to 11 points, you must win by 2. Matches are usually best of 5 games.
• Remember to record all your match results on the match sheet each night that you play.

Alternative Match Formats

To break up the regular format, or on nights when we have a large number of players, or have limited space when playing in other rooms due to schedule conflicts, on some of the tables we may elect to run matches in different formats to keep things moving and to allow everyone a fair share of table time. Ratings points are usually not exchanged in these alternative match formats.

King of the Hill: Matches are one game only, no warm ups. The winner moves up a table and the loser stays at that table. At the top table, the winner stays (for a maximum of three wins) and the loser gets back in line. At the lower tables, losers stay for a maximum of three losses, after which they must sit. In the case of a double vacancy on a table, the next two players in line fill the positions.

Handicapped matches: Sometimes two players, who differ in ratings by a significant amount, can choose to play a "handicapped" match, in which the higher rated player spots the lower rated player a certain number of points each game. The handicap is usually 1 point for every 100 points in ratings difference, rounded to the nearest point. For example: players rated 1337 and 972 choose to play a handicap match; the difference in their ratings is 365 points, so each game would start with a score of 0-4 in favor of the lower rated player. In matches where the handicap is an odd number, the player serving first will serve just once at the start of the match, to make tracking the change in service after every two serves easier.