 Men's Singles Bronze Medal Match at the 2018 Summer Youth Olympics | |
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| Nationality | American |
| Born | 19 June 2000 Milpitas, California |
| Sport | |
| Country | United States |
| Sport | Table tennis |
Medal record | |
Kanak Jha (born June 19, 2000) is an American table tennis player. He is a two-time Olympian (2016 and 2020) and was the US national champion 4 times, winning the national title between 2016 and 2019 for a record four straight national titles.
Jha competed at the 2016 Summer Olympics in the men's singles event and as part of the American team in the men's team event. [1] [2]
He was the youngest American athlete to participate in the 2016 Olympics and is also the first American born in the 2000s to qualify for the Olympics. [3]
Jha also competed at the 2018 Summer Youth Olympics in the boy's event, in which he won a bronze medal. 2018 was somewhat of a breakout year for Jha, as he defeated several notable top players including Wong Chun Ting, Quadri Aruna, An Jaehyun, and Lin Yun-Ju. [4]
Jha won his 4th straight US National title in 2019. Jha pulled off a bronze medal at the 2019 Pan American Games in mixed doubles and singles. In the 2019 World Team Cup, Jha defeated Anton Källberg and Kristian Karlsson to lead the US past Sweden out of the group stage. [5]
Notable international wins for Jha in early 2020 include Uda Yukiya and Zhou Qihao. [6] After the pandemic, Jha played in the 2020 World Cup, in which he lost in seven games to Liam Pitchford and deuce in the seventh to Chuang Chih-yuan, his favorite player growing up. [7] In mid-2020, Jha signed with the German Bundesliga team in Ochsenhausen.
Jha was selected to represent the United States at the Tokyo Olympics in the men's singles and team event. He spent a large amount of his final days training in the United States with his Olympic teammate at the new 888 Table Tennis Center, a club for which he is an ambassador. [8] Jha chose not to defend his US national title in July, opting instead to prepare for the Tokyo Olympics.
At the Tokyo Olympics, Jha lost 4-2 to Russia’s Kirill Skachkov in the round of 64. [9] Team USA lost to Sweden in the first round of the team event, with Jha scoring USA's lone victory over Mattias Falck. [10]
He was given a one year ban in December 2022 for missing three consecutive drug tests.
Timo Boll is a German professional table tennis player, who currently plays for Borussia Düsseldorf. He is currently ranked 45th in the ITTF world rankings as of January 2024. Boll is the most successful German table tennis player of all time, having won several medals at Olympic Games, world cups, and world championships. He was ranked world No. 1 in 2003, 2011 and in March 2018.
Dimitrij Ovtcharov or Dmytro Ovtcharov is a Ukrainian-born German table tennis player. His father Mikhail, a Soviet table tennis champion in 1982, moved his family to Germany shortly after Dimitrij was born.
Ma Long is a Chinese professional table tennis player who is currently ranked number 2 in Men’s Singles by the ITTF and the reigning Olympic and World Cup singles champion. Widely regarded as the greatest table tennis player of all time, he is the first and only male player to complete a career Double Grand Slam as the Olympic gold medalist in men's singles in 2016 and 2020. He held the ranking of number 1 for a total of 64 months, the most by any male in the history of table tennis. He is also champion in World Championships in men's singles in 2015, 2017 and 2019. His records led the International Table Tennis Federation to nickname him "The Dictator" and "The Dragon". Since 2014, he has been the captain of the Chinese national table tennis men's team.
Kasumi Ishikawa is a retired Japanese table tennis player. A regular member of the Japanese national team, she won a silver medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics, a bronze at the 2016 Summer Olympics, and a silver medal at the 2020 Summer Olympics, in Women's team.
Liu Shiwen is a Chinese table tennis player. She is a five-time World Cup champion, one-time World Champion, three-time ITTF World Tour Grand Finals champion and four-time Asian Cup champion. She is known to be one of the fastest players in the world.
Jeoung Young-sik is a South Korean table tennis player. He debuted internationally in 2010 and won a silver and a bronze medal at the Asian Games. Between 2010 and 2018 he won six bronze medals at the world championships. He reached the world ranking #7 in February 2017. His father Jeoung Hae-chul was also a competitive table tennis player.
Koki Niwa is a Japanese male table tennis player. He is the gold medalist at the 2010 Youth Olympics and he won the World Junior Table Tennis Championships in 2010 (doubles) and 2011 (singles).
Chen Meng is a Chinese professional table tennis player. She joined the provincial team when she was 9 and joined the national team when she was only 13 in 2007. She is the women's singles champion of the ITTF Women's World Cup in 2020, the ITTF World Tour Grand Finals in 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020 and also at the inaugural WTT Singapore Smash. She is also the silver medalist of women's singles in the 2019 World Table Tennis Championships and a double gold medalist in the 2020 Summer Olympics.
Mima Ito is a Japanese table tennis player. She won a bronze medal in the Women's Team event at the 2016 Summer Olympics when she was 15 years old. At the 2020 Summer Olympics, she won the gold medal with her partner Jun Mizutani in the Mixed Doubles event which made its debut, a bronze medal in the Women's singles, and a silver medal in the Women's Team event.
Xu Xin is a Chinese professional table tennis player who is currently ranked world No. 103 as of May 2023 for men's singles by the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF). He first reached his career-high singles ranking of world No. 1 in January 2013.
Kristian Gunnar Karlsson is a Swedish professional table tennis player.
Fan Zhendong is a Chinese professional table tennis player. After joining the Chinese National Table Tennis Team in 2012 as the youngest member of the team, he went on to become the youngest ITTF World Tour Champion and the youngest World Table Tennis Champion. In April 2018, he achieved the top spot in the world rankings after holding position No. 2 for 29 consecutive months, starting from November 2015.
Mattias Falck is a Swedish table tennis player.
Tomokazu Harimoto is a Japanese professional table tennis player who is currently world rank number 4 in ITTF. In 2016, he won the world junior singles and team title at the 2016 World Junior Table Tennis Championships for Japan.
Sun Yingsha is a Chinese professional table tennis player. She is the current world No. 1 in women's singles.
An Jae-hyun is a South Korean table tennis player.
The men's singles table tennis event was part of the table tennis programme at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. The event took place from 24 July to 30 July 2021 at Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium.
Yukiya Uda is a Japanese table tennis player. He is also a member of the JOC Elite Academy (JOCエリートアカデミー) in Tokyo.
Anton Källberg is a Swedish table tennis player.
Zhou Xin is an American table tennis player. He qualified to represent Team USA in the 2020 Summer Olympics, competing on the men's team alongside Kanak Jha and Nikhil Kumar. Zhou and Kumar were defeated by Swedish Anton Källberg and Kristian Karlsson in the doubles match and he also lost to Anton Källberg in the singles match.
   | This biographical article relating to an American table tennis figure is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
