My Cringy Essays

Badminton

Essay for Phy. Ed. 

Date: January 7th, 2017

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Most people may not know that badminton is actually the second most popular sport to participate in after soccer worldwide. Despite this, many don't understand the details behind "just hitting a birdie with a racket". There are different boundaries for the court depending on if singles or doubles is played. Also, there are many different shots and a few serves to choose from.

Speaking of the rules, let's begin with gameplay. The game of Badminton can either be played singles or doubles. Singles is one versus one, and doubles is two against two. The court for singles is narrow and long, while the court for doubles is wide and long. You can serve from the short or long service line, but doubles usually serves from the long service line that is closer to the net from the singles long service line. The serve must pass the short service line on your opponent's side and must be served diagonally. In a singles game, if your score is even you serve from the right service court. If your score is odd, you serve from the left service court. For a doubles game, the person in the right service court serves when your score is even. The person in the left service court serves when your score is odd. Another doubles rule is you and your partner must switch places every time you score on your team's serve. There are two types of scoring; rally and official. With rally scoring, every time your opponent hits the birdie out of bounds or misses a shot/serve you receive a point and vice versa. Official scoring's rules are that you must have the serve in that rally to get the point. A game of badminton is played to twenty-one points. A player must win by two points, and if the game must continue further it's capped at thirty points. Although these may be the rules, there are still different shots.

There are five different shots in badminton, and probably more that are less common than these five. The first is the clear shot, the most used shot by beginners. The clear shot is a shot that goes high in the air and deep to the back of the opponent's court. The next shot is called the drive shot. A drive shot is a quick, flat shot aimed directly at the opponent's face or upper body. After that is the drop shot, which is performed by aiming low just over the net so the opponent will have to run forward to hit the birdie if they are in the back of their court. Then, there is the smash shot. A smash is a powerful shot aimed steeply downward at the opponent's feet. The last shot is a net shot. The net shot is a shot that is hit when standing near the net. It is a short flick over to the opponent's court so the birdie lands just barely over the net. While there are these shots, let's not forget about the different kinds of serves.

There are three different serves in badminton. The first is the short serve, which is hit from the short service line. Singles and doubles have the same short service lines, but different long service lines. The next serve is the long serve, which is served from the long service line. The singles long service line happens to be on the back boundary line, while the doubles long service line is its own line. The last type of serve is called a let, which occurs when the birdie is hit into the net on a serve.

Overall, badminton is my favorite unit of gym class. It's not too physical and doesn't require you to be good at throwing or catching. Badminton is sort of relaxed and allows you to think. You do need good reflexes, though, due to how fast your opponent can hit the birdie back to you. As for the tournaments, they were short-lived for me. My partner and I lost our first two games and were out right away. I was hoping to play against more people. Maybe next year will have better luck for me.