Gdansk is part of the Tricity conglomeration, together with Gdynia and Sopot, in the north of Poland. It is the birthplace of the “Solidarity” movement, led by Lech Walesa, who is not only a Nobel Peace Prize holder and former President of Poland but also a big table tennis enthusiast and the Honorary Patron of the 2011 ETTC.

Gdansk is the biggest city of the Pomerania region, situated on the Baltic Sea at the mouth of the Motlawa river. It is Poland’s fourth largest city with a population size of half a million people.

The city has a rich history as seaport playing an important role in trade routes within the Baltic region. Throughout the ages it has undergone a complex political history with periods of Polish and Germanic rule, as well as two periods as a free city, consequently Gdansk is now a melting pot of many cultures, nationalities and denominations.

It was in the city of Gdansk that the first shots of the II World War were fired. However, despite its turbulent political history Gdansk together with its citizens have managed to re-build a thriving, vibrant metropolis, which now rightly deserves to be called the “Pearl of the North”.

Gdansk is famous not only for Lech Walesa – the current Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk also hails from this city. It is also well-known for nurturing Polish table tennis stars such as Andrzej Grubba and Natalia Partyka. Here, after Andrzej Grubba’s passing in 2005, the Polish Table Tennis Association Training Academy was established in his name, and is now a core training centre for the development of future Polish table tennis stars. Grubba was also a representative of the club AZS-AWF Gdansk, which won the European Cup in 1983. Most suitably one can now say that Gdansk is the table tennis capital of Poland.

To learn more about Gdansk go to the city's official website.