Monday, April 18, 2011

Badminton Trivia - Interesting details

Badminton Trivia for you!
Interesting details and fun facts about the finer and lesser known points of badminton.

Trivia #1:
Badminton is the fastest known racquet sport in the world in terms of racquet speeds of players. The fastest badminton stroke was doubles player Fu Haifeng's 206 mph (332 km/h) recorded smash on June 3-2005 in the Sudirman Cup.
Compared to this, in tennis, the fastest recorded stroke is Ivo Karlovic's 156 mph (251 km/h) serve.

Trivia #2:
Badminton became a medal sport at the Olympics from the 1992 Barcelona Olympic games held at Spain. Before that badminton had been twice an exhibition sport at the Olympics, once in the 1972 Munich games and then at the 1988 Seoul games.

Trivia #3:
In its early form, Badminton was known as the 'Poona' game and was played by British Officers who were stationed at the city of Poona in India in the 1860s.

Trivia #4:
Badminton got its name from the 'Badminton House' the estate of the Duke of Beaufort, of Gloucestershire county, where at a party British officers played the 'Poona game' and then it became popular with the British elite.

Trivia #5:
Shuttlecocks which are a unique feature of badminton have a high drag and tend to fly through the air due to their unique aerodynamic properties. Interestingly, the heavier the shuttlecock is, the faster it flies. Shuttlecocks also fly faster in higher temperatures and at higher altitudes.


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2 comments:

  1. regarding trivia #3, wasnt the game of badminton first called BATTLEDORE AND SHUTTLECOCK then eventually was also called Poona after the town in India where the British garrison was?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yes. In mainland Europe, battledore and shuttlecock was a traditional game that was played, and badminton is believed to have its origins in the game. Also this was long before the Poona game came into existence.

    However, some notable differences were that in battledore, there was no badminton net in between the players, whereas in the Poona version, the British officers introduced adding a net to the game, bringing badminton closer to the form that its in today.

    I had posted another article related to the possible origins of badminton. Here's the link which you many find interesting. http://mybadmintonbook.blogspot.com/2011/04/badminton-history.html

    ReplyDelete