the floor on CBA will be laid on concrete. i initially feel that just 10mm of padding on top of hard concrete seems a bit thin. but that's the way it is done in most gyms like GGBC/BBC and now CBA. and we have had pretty good review of them and i play in GGBC regularly and it feels ok. so i guess 10mm is sufficient. my knees like bintang style floor best. padding + wood + mat.
Agreed! Is this flooring composition the case at all Bintang locations? May they can join the Milpitas/Fremont scrum with a center of their own here... Dublin and Sunnyvale are just a tad too far...
there is a "rumor" on that: http://www.badmintoncentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=82915 Bintang started working on wooden based flooring with Bintang Sunnyvale. Campbell is the first one that has a good result. according to Phu, they improve it on every new location, so Dublin should be better than Campbell (is it? i haven't been there) and SSF should be better than Dublin.
Floor in Doublin felt the same as Sunnyvale. Both are excellent for your knees. The ceiling is higher in Doublin so it's better.
CBA invited me again to check out their progress. it looks like things are coming along quite nicely. they have all the floors done and they look very nice. I brought my kits and hit around for 30+mins in one of the court. the grip is excellent and the flooring didn't bother my knees. so it appears the floor pases my knee test. the lighting is very bright and seems OK to the eye. here is a latest pic. more will come when i have them processed.
Thanks for sharing the picture. Lighting and floors look great, the spacing between the courts appears quite tight!
the ceiling looks curved the middle of the gym looks higher... so when they say its 32 ft high is that the highest part of lowest? if its the highest than how high is the lowest part?
It looks to me a wide-angled lens is used, so things "naturally" appear curved. Even the pillers are not parallel to each other.
yes. they are bintang sunnyvale tight between courts, but quite spacious at the end. there are big patches between some courts that they say will have nice poolside style lounge chair.
i don't know. i am guessing that the lowest part won't be more than a couple of feet lower than the highest, so maybe 28-29feet, which is still pretty decent. we played at a court right next to the pillar and that's probably 32 feet and no where did i manage to get close to the ceiling.
when i went there on Friday, there were only 3 of us playing in one court. not sure if anyone has played in a totally empty gym before, but the sound of it is excellent. each hit sounds is clearly heard and the multiple levels of echo after that. i have a recording of it. badminton fanaticism to the fullest.
Many of us went to play at CBA during the soft openning this afernoon. I have to say that I feel the floor is pretty hard on my knees after 2 hours of play. The floor is definitely harder than Bintang, and I personally feel it is harder than UBC as well. It is probably just a bit softer than the old Smash City. I know a few players including myself quit playing at Smash City because our knees hurt after a few weeks playing there. I was told the overall thickness at CBA is 10mm which is the international standard. I however strongly prefer softer floor. I don't think I can handle 2 to 3 visits per week at CBA. So no membership at this point, just pay at door if I go there again. Would be nice if we can convince CBA to add padding to 1 to 3 courts to test out. I heard Phu at Bintang experimented with their floor many times before they get it to work.
A lot of players keep saying bbc(3) is too hard compared to bintang, or ggbc is too hard compared to bintang. And now i'm hearing cba is too hard compared to bintang! BBC and GGBC are the same pulastic flooring system and it looked like CBA has a specialized 10mm pvc flooring system. Part of the reason they are set up this way is that they are trying to conform to the same standard. Bintang on the otherhand has in the past had subpar flooring. Their newer flooring has been improved, but I would still say it is subpar. Dont get me wrong, I like bintang. I play at both campbell and sunnyvale but the reason bintang flooring is so "soft" is because the wood flooring below it is not fully supported. It has a "spring" feel when you jump and land because it is flexing. The reason i dislike this flooring is for 2 reasons. Firstly, I believe I can feel a difference in reaction for my steps. Its very minor but its the same thing when you try to run in sand. You first compress the floor, and then you move and this results in slow movement. Secondly, you will not find this at any other gym. If you dont play anywhere else that is fine, but to keep saying bintang is the best, or bintang is the softest, doesnt mean anything when you have to compete at sjsu, and you play on a hard wood floor. Yes, bintang has soft flooring, as long as that is your home gym and you dont plan to play anywhere else that is fine, but just understand, almost everywhere else you go will have flooring closer to what CBA, BBC, and GGBC which is already good. Just imagine if all we had was old Smash City cement O yea, one fun thing about bintang is if you find a soft spot you can use it to your advantage since it acts like a trampoline. Trampoline jump smash!
I don't disagree that CBA floor is probably at the standard spec, and softer floor sacrifices responsiveness. The trade off I choose (and I think most people over 35 should) is to keep me in the game for a few extra years. If I were professional player, or if I were below 30 years old, my preference would have been different, but...
different people have different preferences. some like hard floors, some like soft ones. i have a friend who like slippery floor, but i personally like stickier floor.
