Back from another tournament 1 win and 1 loss = no finals today either. After watching the two I think the biggest takeaways were - more confidence in the front court around service situation. I put my racket down because I think I'm scared it will hit the birdy and cause an error so I keep ti down. The first pair had a older yet weaker dude and a stronger but technically weaker (and younger) guy in the back. The older guy would just drive shots right over my head all around the court and put my rear player under pressure. If I had my racket up I think it would help limit the angles the enemy would feel comfortable playing - which even if I don't play anything has value in itself. Just need to enforce that. - just better and more consistent lifts Thoughts guys?
Agree about putting the racquet up. Although yes you might mishit, those aren’t going to be many points and there are going to be more situations where the opponents have to lift the shuttle above your racquet head to be safe. Then playing a higher lift will give more time for your partner to setup up for a better shot.
Moving to the Philippines Hey guys! Sorry for the infrequent updates - I think as time goes by I'm more inclined to just record and have been lazy to write up! Sorry about that. But yeah, I think it's time I close my chapter in Korea for a few non-badminton-related reasons. - Me and the gf broke up. Sure I could stay but she was the reason I came to Korea over anywhere else for badminton. - Tired of Korea's toxicity and dark side. Don't wanna explain but you can just google it lol. - Part of me wanting to just travel. So yeah! Going to the motherland, gonna explore my roots, learn my culture, etc. the badminton level here is definitely lower but still better than me so I'll be able to improve. Linked below is my last sparring session!
Haven't made an update in a while - as I settle down in Philippines the written updates should resume regular cadence. IN meantime, enjoy this:
September Update Hey guys, I'm back. The Philippines has been good to me, since my last post I've: Solidified a training schedule where I'm having 1 on 1 sessions 4-5 times a week Been recently upping the session times to 2 hours instead of 1 Played in a tournament where I was in a skill bracket higher than me Gained a ton of doubles experience through sparring and training Secured a 1-year lease for a condo within 6 minutes of walking distance of the courts! As for what I've been training lately, it's been definitely a heavy heavy focus of doubles. Mostly defense and flat game. I've realized that in both singles and doubles I've got the basics down and it's really coming down to shot quality and consistency. So for singles/technical days I'm working on my backhand drops and cross nets. On more active days it's multifeed training, with a focus on doubles defense/ front court play. I've also noticed I've gotten more comfortable playing/recieving a high serve in doubles. Guess I'm getting lazy/more comfortable in my defense. When I have a singles player who challenges me, I of course switch to low serve. ANother thing I've noticed is I've gotten more wristy. I think it's from playing a lot of doubles front - I'm playing a lot of half smashes/stick smashes, drives, and a lot of short movements which are mostly forearm. This has seemed to carry over and given me more confidence in using them in singles/utilziing the forearm effectively in full smashes. Something mentally has clicked for me and I'm getting to a point where I actively jump smash in mixed/mens doubles. In short it seemed experience was something I was greatly lacking and something finally clicked. I think I'm in a good groove training wise, balancing badminton training and sparring. I actually hadn't hit the gym in a while )4-6 weeks) and am reintroducing that as it's finally taking a toll in my badminton (feel smashes could be harder, could be more explosive legs wise) so we're back in the gym too. Am also considering switching to a Youtube Video format for these and ending the written journal here, but haven't made a decision on that. Will keep you guys updated!
I notice at the net, for me, I feel you could use more finger technique to generate a shorter swing with more control rather than generating power through your wrist and having a bigger swing. I also notice at the net, forehand side, far forehands are OK and the shaft of the racquet angles outwards to the right. But for the forehands that are not so far, you step across with the body too much to the right. Just a small step across and reaching out would be ok. When you step across too much, your racquet shaft is vertical or angled to the left of your hand when you hit the shuttle - there’s a tendency to have less control on the shuttle.
The using more finger and being more precise is def a confidence and mental thing. I'm getting there. And great observation on the next, I def need to be more "exact" in my steps and prep
November Update Hey guys. As foretold, I have been getting further away from BC and more into YouTube, IG, and Discord as that seems to be where the communities are growing (I think I have a side goal of being a badminton youtuber lol) But this is still my home, I know a lot of people read this kind of things, so I always come back October was an interesting month, just a lot of focus on front doubles work. I hosted a discord meetup and found a D/E level partner, and we trained a lot. We just finished the tournament a few days ago, which unfortunately had a lot of smurfs in D (for $$) so we withdrew but our first two matches were pretty level. Disclaimer about the first match: we were sitting down for 2.5 hours and had no warmup. Improvements for sure. Am playing flatter, getting more consistent, and have more of a doubles player mindset. But still a long way to go! I'm writing this late as I am restless and have a lot of thoughts to myself. Am wondering if I'm improving effectively. Am wondering if I'll ever get out of D ranking lol. I wanna be B ranking by end of next year but am not sure if that's possible. For reference, I train 5 days a week, usually 2 hours of 1 on 1 with my coach. on the 5th day will be sparring. Gym I aim to do 2-3 times a week as well. I think maybe I'm over training, and am forgetting to also enjoy myself. I may pull back from training a bit, and just do queing (sparring) more for these next 2 weeks (have another tournament end of month) which will help with game experience and hopefully let me enjoy the game (rekindle that joy) as I think I'm going through a lull again.
Drastic improvement in short time periods doesn't happen in developed players. You have to really, really focus on a single aspect of your game for 1-4 weeks, or for a few months to really improve it (in my experience). I'm currently trying to improve my doubles return of serve, but I am doing it on court and don't have any spare time (or money) to go seek a coach like you have. Has your coach gone over what they saw in the footage and said what could be improved? It's a long Journey. Make sure you enjoy yourself.
What do you do with your coach? I don’t watch the full footage but mostly what I see are routines but are you still revising on technical skills? Some points that I see are these: Backhands generally strong Forehand side when shuttle is flat or low is weak due to a couple of factors. A) you plant your right leg on the lunge and then swing the racquet far too often. Aim to hit the shuttle at the same time as landing the right foot. B) your racquet preparation with your fingers is not good. When you prepare to hit, the handle is right up against the whole of the hand. You can’t use the last three fingers to generate racquet head movement. The result is you use your whole arm to hit and the movement is unstable with inconsistent quality. After a low serve for doubles you hang the racquet very very low. You need to generate that mindset of taking the shuttle earlier on the third shot if it comes to your zonal area. I think this has been mentioned in the past. It doesn’t take much effort to raise the racquet a bit after you serve. If you keep playing with the tactical mindset of a D grade, well, you get stuck with the D’s. apologies if this advice comes across as a bit harsh. Keep up the effort!
Seconded what Cheung wrote. I watched some of your sparring footage with your coach and with your ambition I would look into another coach if possible. Watching your coach play lifts on the service return that doesnt reach the first service line makes me want to gouge my eyes out. Doubles is supposed to be a game of pressure for the attack and by completely nullifying that aspect, I don't know what you guys are sparring for. Since you have an enormous amount of on court training, be diligent with your coach since practice makes permanent and you most likely do not want to go through relearning basic technical aspects again. If you are willing to travel to Malaysia or similar I can give some advice on good training facilities but for me it looks like the effort you put in will not reward you with your goals in mind at your current facility.
I wanted to see what the coach said before I waded in with any areas to improve from the footage shown ^^. At 16:05, there is an example of the racquet being too low. You did this a lot and it should be an easy thing to change. It's the same principle as hitting a clear or smash. You get more time to react if the racquet is already near the shuttle and you can take it from a higher point. In the timestamped situation it lets you push or kill the shuttle.
D to B in a year sounds ridiculous. I very much doubt that is possible. Maybe there are some pro players that pulled that off! But I doubt their experience is anything like a normal person. I remember a coach that knew about grading people, telling me there is a big range within C+! (Maybe there is extra resistance to push somebody from one grade to another). And at some point age can become a factor to how far you will get too! Re overtraining, a way to help prevent that is cancellations, / non bookings, don't go on court if sore and in need of recovery . Factoring in enjoyment, which you mention, is an interesting idea that might help too in preventing overtraining. And as you rightly mention, pulling back from training is a good way of preventing over training!
No I needed this. You always been very kind to me so no worries. And yes, I do need to bring it up more. Something I'm working on. This was with my partner who was far weaker then me. I believe the coach was doing this on purpose, making it "easier" for us. I've seen him play seriously (he's national level here in PH) and he can obviously play quite well. I sure am. DM me. I've been thinking Taufik's camp in Indonesia since they have a doubles focused camp (they split players into singles/doubles) which sounds like my cup of tea. Okay didn't realize that. Regardless, having an ambitious goal and falling short will usually lead to more progress. When I'm with a partner around my strength I'm confident I can win D tournaments here in PH. But yeah, there are people that are forever stuck in C... so maybe that will be the grind and it maybe I just get to mid-high C. Been thinking that to take it to the next level, I need to spend a month - 2 months at a training camp again. We'll see. Await your guys feedback always <3
For doubles, I think D to B in one year is possible but you have to critically look at your strengths and weakness and also play some of the C and B players to remind yourself of areas of your game where you are weak. At the moment, you are training shots - I don’t get the feel you are really analysing yourself in making further gains in technique or timing. That forehand technique and its late timing when you step out to the right is a something I thought you would have sorted out by now. It’s a situation that can be described as training but at a plateau. Maybe you’re a bit comfortable with your level at present and just enjoying the game (which is also fine). Remember that you need purposeful practice to improve - are you training for fitness, consistency or technique ? Different routines train different aspects. There should be a purposeful learning phase, practice, incorporation into routines, incorporation to set plays/mini game situations then consolidation reinforcement into proper matches. Given the flexibility and hours that @precrime3 can put in (again I am very jealous) the learning and practice phases can be quite accelerated compared to people working 35-40 hours a week. The consolidation phase might be not able to be rushed and yes, it might be a month before a change can be seen to be used in a match. I don’t see much evidence of set play training in the videos so far. It’s an important part of doubles play.
timestamps plz? it's hard for me to analyze technique because I don't know what proper technique is I guess... i feel all my shots are "good enough" so I've just been working on making them better. Maybe it is time for a smarter doubles coach. But at the moment few exist in PH... so this is my training routine atm.
I hope the people commenting telling you you are in error do mention timestamps/video. On another note I remember last year you posted a video where a bunch of errors caught my eye I mentioned them in post #352 including which rally and a timestamp.. I haven't seen any errors like that in the recent video I saw, so that looks like a huge improvement, but it'd be interesting to see you play with that particular female partner again.. to see the difference / if there is a difference. Looking here You have maybe an unconventional racket preparation. I would suggest being able to do a conventional racket prep, by that I mean, the kind of racket preparations that you see Pro Players using. That way if anybody says "hey you're wrong", then you can point them to a pro player preparing it the same way and say if you're wrong then why are they doing it like that then? 'cos ultimately what people tend to say is right and wrong is just based on looking just like what pro players do I have used 4 different conventional racket preparations. One low one and three high ones. I didn't learn that one you have there.. My low racket prep was more tucked in. At some point though I was told that even if my racket preparation was inconsistent I was still hitting them well.. so maybe I was outside of the four I knew, but I also heard it's possible to hit it well regardless of racket preparation, but that when beginning it's good to have a consistent racket preparation. And i've experimented wit not recommended racket preps and been told i'm hitting them well. Some say that if you prepare it low then you'll hit it late, but that's not really true, 'cos it just means the racket prep is longer, and you should start the swing when the shuttle is higher. It is a bit easier to time if your racket prep is higher. But so long as you have some idea of where the shuttle is in the air and how long it takes to come down, given the shuttle and the hall, from practising some in the hall with the shuttles, then you can get the timing right, given whichever racket prep. You should be able to do a or some conventional racket preps though so that nobody would say is wrong..Or, since there's often somebody that could say it's wrong, then so that if somebody says it's wrong, you can do it how they want or how you know pro players do it and show them the pros doing it like you are. You though I guess aren't preparing it like any pro .. So I suggest you either find a pro player that prepares the racket like you do and say "SO THERE!" Look here at TTY here Her elbow isn't high, so perhaps that'd be a low prep.. But look at where her arm is pointing, it's pointing fairly upwards. So her hand is not level with her elbow, her hand is more like where her ear is People often say Relax relax, your racket prep is probably too relaxed in that OK your elbow isn't high , hers isn't either.. But when the elbow isn't high, so the angle at the armpit is much less than 90 degrees, then I think you need to have a smaller angle at the elbow. judging by a pro like TTY.. So don't relax at the elbow joint so much that your forearm drops putting your hand so low... Looking here at 1:50 in the above video, you might have a low contact point. (see the shuttle there in the picture) You won the point, Partly because you hit it so flat, sometimes really flat ones can work 'cos people aren't used to them! 'cos the most typical slash defense is most ready for a potential steep one! Coaches tend to recommend steeper ones where possible! An issue with flatter ones is if the opponent does get to it then they have more options. The opponent that you caught was put under some pressure by his partner's shot. Now, trying to figure out what Cheung is talking about where he wrote "you plant your right leg on the lunge and then swing the racquet far too often. " and hasn't yet provided any screenshot or timeframe or mention of what video he saw it.. I don't know exactly what he means but I am a bit familiar with a concept like it but I'll take a wild guess at what he might possibly mean anyhow At 2:55 your partner does a bad serve, the opponent attacks it . You step to the side and swing and hit it. Maybe he's saying that's wrong. Maybe he thinks you should have started your swing while you stepped.. The thing is though, you have time, given where you are. If you were to stand closer to your partner when he serves, then you could get to that shuttle quicker, you'd also have less time to get to it. And you wouldn't have time to step and then swing, you'd be stepping with your racket out and hitting it. It can make it easier by putting more pressure on your opponents. But it's different. If you it it and they hit it back you'd have to get back more quickly than you otherwise would. But you can cut things out more. If you stand closer, then you might find that the footwork at the back needs adjustments. As well as footwork to the shuttle being a bit different as you take it a bit earlier. There are big advantages in being closer. That said, Looking at this really good video "Badminton Nice Angle Camera, Japan Badminton Final MD 2015 Lee Yoo VS Fu Hai Feng Zhang Nan Set" They aren't super close to each other. Though you are probably still a bit further back than that pro guy is.. And if you see at that rally the red/black guy whose partner is serving, receives the third shot and doesn't have time to step then swing. That whole game is a different pace to your game though.
