Table tennis, handball… After the Olympics, sports clubs overwhelmed by registration requests

In this gymnasium in Levallois-Perret, the room is full. These enthusiasts, rackets in hand, score points on the thirty ping-pong tables available. Like other sports clubs in France, it is overwhelmed by registration requests, the secretariat’s phone does not stop ringing and all the training slots are already full.

“It’s the Lebrun effect, I’m like a madman”

Like many, it was after admiring the brothers Alexis and Félix Lebrun on TV, during the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, that Jean-Pierre, a young retiree, decided to register. “It’s the Lebrun effect. I followed the Olympics like crazy and I started pinging, I feel like I’m getting younger,” he says.

To cope with this influx of new licensees, the club of this town of Hauts-de-Seine, which has welcomed into its fold the greatest champions (Jacques Secutin and Jean-Philippe Gatien but also Simon Gauzy, bronze medal by teams at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games), had to organize themselves. “We do doubles, we do three-way exercises, we serve the tables a little but for us it’s great!” exclaims sports director Lenaick Loyant.

Even if this sport is dominated by the Chinese, it is now brought to France by the Lebrun brothers. Table tennis has taken more than 20% of registrations and could rise to 250,000 licensees by June 2025, anticipates the French Federation (FFTT).

A tidal wave of registrations for handball and indoor sports

Despite the failure of the Blues in the quarter-finals of the Olympic tournament, the handball clubs are also overwhelmed by registration requests, to such an extent that the president of the federation, Philippe Bana, explains that he will not be able to not welcome everyone. “It’s a real tidal wave, children invading the gymnasiums, we are reaching saturation of equipment and perhaps we, in handball, will refuse 100,000 licensees,” he fears.

Volleyball clubs, and even basketball clubs, have also refused people since September. The French Swimming Federation is also sounding the alarm with a pool of swimming pools that are 40 years old on average. Finally, the success of the Paralympic Games also puts certain clubs in difficulty due to a lack of resources and volunteers.