have played badminton before but I have not played in the last six years. My skills are rusty. I did registed an adult intermediate today because I do not think I am welcome in the drop-in. I have few question about the drop-in session. Q's: If I am suck, would people still want to play with me? Q's: Why some people want to join the "Super Elite" course since you can drop-in to play with other pros. That course is expensive, I assume people in the Super Elite are on their own most of time anyway. Q's: How do I know if the group of people are in good characters and not gang members? I cannot imagine while I am playing, someone beside me is being rude or selling drugs to me. (It is just an example) Q's: Although I am suck in single, I perfer single. With limited 4 court in Clear One during the session hours, how can that be possible? Is that mean, I can only team up with someone else? Sorry for the above questions, but I really want to know.
Anyone can show up for drop-in. It doesn't matter if you're good, rusty, or have never played badminton before in your life. It's entirely open to the public, and the range of skill on any given drop-in varies quite widely from extreme beginners to more "advanced" players. You just "drop-in" and play with whoever is there. If you joined adult intermediate, I hope you do realize it's a training group. You most likely won't be playing games at all, but rather learning techniques and practising them. There are players who dislike playing with people too far below their skill level. Then again, a lot of players like playing with players of similar level that they can beat . Of course there are those who won't like playing with you at all, and others won't mind at all, so it really doesn't matter. Just go out and try it. Super Elite is also a training group to develop advanced skills and physical ability. If you ever reach that level of skill, you'll understand the need for such a group. Drop-in is doubles games only. You can't play singles unless not enough people showing up to fill all the courts with doubles games. In other words, you must play doubles unless not enough people show up to fill all the courts. You can only play singles by booking an entire court for private use.
Ok, let's handle those questions one at a time: As timeless was saying, there is a variety of skill levels at any drop-in sessions. Generally, most drop-in places tend to have a certain crowd. So if you make yourself a regular at, say, ClearOne on Friday nights, you're pretty soon gonna recognize the majority of the people who goes there. You'll soon have a decent assessment of the various players' skill levels (and you'll be assessed yourself as well). You can then select your games a little more carefully, and others will do the same with you as well, to ensure that the game is at least somewhat enjoyable for everyone. The thing is, unless you are being a jerk yourself on the court, you're gonna find people who are willing to play with you. I'd like to add the fact quite a few of those players in the Super Elite group compete at the provincial level. As such, they need coaching and worthy opponents to continue to refine their skills. And during the session, they're not really on the own. Darryl observes their games and give them feedback on how they did. ~whoa!!! I think you're being a little paranoid here. Gang members playing badminton?! I haven't seen that myself at ClearOne. You might want to keep an eye on your personal belongings every now and then, but other than that, ClearOne is a pretty decent place. -Rick
Adult Intermediate???....holy...didn't know that another BF member is in the same class.... and no, I haven't seen anyone selling drugs at ClearOne...
Damn! And here I thought badders are decent bunch. How naive am I?!! I guess it's possible that drug dealers wanna expand their market into less obvious demographics.
Clearone is a good place to play! about drop in... sometimes extremely crowded sometimes dead quiet... but people generally will play with u!!!.. n u get to meet new people too btw..the guy who works there during the drop in period is NICE.. so u can talk with him and ask him to play with u ....
C1 drop in ClearOne has drop-in sessions only on Fri and Sat nites now. It is better you bring 3 friends to the drop-in to ensure there will be games for yourself.
And I believe the friday evening sessions is usually quite crowded from what I see after my group lesson on friday...which reminds me, are you still taking that group lesson?...we should like meet up and practice those shots that he taught us.
Do they have an orderly rotation in place? Signup boards for each court? It shouldn't be too bad if everybody gets a chance to play. Fighting for courts would definitely ruin my mood to play.
ClearOne does have a sign-up board for rotations and stuff, but people don't follow it very closely. Rather, it is more accurate to say that people will sign up, but when it is their turn to play, they either forget or are too busy chatting and stuff, so things are a bit chaotic. -Rick
That's alright... as long as their names are legible. I don't mind yelling out names the whole night just to get things moving along. Makes it easier to know people and remember their names. People embarassed about having their names yelled out loud?! They better move faster to the courts then!. In fact, one of the reasons why I love playing in Collingwood is because BMS takes care of things and make sure the rotations go smoothly.
