| Mike Skinner - Expert in Table Tennis
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As with many immigrants to Canada, Mike was no different than many others who arrived in the early days, except he had a passion for table tennis. He immediately found a club for table tennis in Montreal and later on moved to Ontario where he continued as a player. Mike soon discovered that he could contribute to the growth of the sport in a variety of ways. The one that interested him the most was the field of officiating. This is how his career bagan more than 50 years ago.
Mike has served the interests of Table Tennis as an organizer at local, provincial, national and international levels. His career spans many decades with accomplishments and contributions in all areas of the sport. The following is a list of major accomplishments over the years.
- Attended 21 World Table Tennis Championships, 19 consecutively, including Suzhou
- 4 Olympic Games, 3 different capacities including umpire of Mens Singles Final in Seoul
- 3 World Junior Table Tennis Championships
- 2 Commonwealth Games
- 2 Commonwealth Championships
- 1 Pan American Games
- 2 World Veterans Championships
- Innumerable Canadian tournaments, too many to count
Mike has also been recognized during his table tennis career with a variety of honors and awards. Most notably are the Betty Tweedy Award (Administration), Art Barran Award (Officiating), Perc McLeod Award (Contribution to Canada given by OTTA), and the Commemorative Medal to celebrate the 125th Anniversary of the Confederation of Canada.
In 1975 Mike was Manager of the TTCAN contingent that toured Japan for 6 or 7 weeks. The group of juniors included Adham Sharara, Errol Caetano, Violetta Nesukaitis, Rod Young, Christine Forgo and others. Zlatko Cordas was the coach and Frank Karika was the Assistant Manager.
He was actually laid off his job, as an engineer, for taking too much time off work!!!!!! (It was an opportunity of a lifetime).
Mike has served for the past two years as a Board of Director member for TTCAN. He currently serves as a Special advisor to the ITTF – URC and is an evaluator for both Referees and Umpires at the National and International level.
Canada is very proud to profile Mike Skinner and acknowledge his contributions during an outstanding career in table tennis.
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