Junior of the Month: Atha Fong

By Wallace Liu

As a curious seven-year-old, Atha Fong tagged along after her siblings in sports camp, watching them play various sports. She was most excited, however, when they played table tennis. Mesmerized by the flight and plight of the little orange balls, Atha began picking them up for her siblings, and quickly became eager to bang them around herself. Her parents initially rejected Atha’s plea to play, as she was not yet tall enough to see over the table. But Atha persisted, and soon she was allowed to enter Bill Lui’s coaching program at the Concord Table Tennis Club.

After developing proper fundamentals in Concord, Atha improved quickly into an aggressive looper. In the past few years, her junior career has blossomed. She won the Joel Ferrell Award for athletic ability and sportsmanship at the 2004 Junior Olympics, where she also won three different playing titles. In late 2005, Atha reached her highest rating yet at 2177. Then at the National Championships last December, she made the National Junior Team for the first time by placing second in the Junior Girls’ team trials. This earned her a spot to compete in the North American Championships, where she finished an impressive third in Girls’ Singles. Atha also teamed up with Judy Hugh to reach the semifinals of Women’s Doubles and the final of Junior Girls’ Doubles.

Known for her powerful forehand attacks, Atha is trying to polish her backhand and sharpen her sense of touch. Now coached by Dennis Davis and Stefan Feth, she plays five times a week at both Concord and the Palo Alto Table Tennis Club. This summer, she will also train in the USATT training camps in Texas and China, in anticipation of playing in her first World Junior Circuit, in China.

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