I'm reading Downey's book right now, at the part where he's talking about different grips: forehand grip, backhand grip, and universal grip. He draws a nice diagram of the handle but never makes use of it. His descriptions of the three also sound exactly the same. He might be a gifted coach but he's an awful writer! Here's an exerpt: Forehand: Hold the racket gently in your fingers with the palm positioned mainly behind the racket handle. Backhand: Place your thumb flat behind the racket handle with your fingers spread out to hold it gently. Universal: Place your thumb flat on the diagonal edge of the racket handle and spread your finders to hold the racket handle. Redundancy: How is it even possible to hold the racquet in front of the handle (on the shaft)!!?? Dangling pronouns: what does "it" refer to. etc etc. You guys on the otherhand, are coherent writers for the most part. What's the difference between the three grips? They sound exactly the same. I've attached a picture of a badminton handle from his book for your convience.
My interpretation.............. Forehand the handle should be in the fingers not in the palm (the bit about the palm behind the handle i think) This means the big end of the handle will protruding from the side of your hand , not into your wrist. Backhand place your thumb flat on the wide flat side of the handle
I'm just curious to know if you still do the V grip for forehand and such since I believe Cheung or someone else said that as you progress that you change your grip to whatever you're comfortable with and the V grip is sort of just like a beginner technique? Not sure but I'll have to find it.
it's either the diagonal edge mentioned above, the bump at the bottom of the handle, or the cone. I've seen it used for all three but it usually refers to the diagonal edge in the diagram.
I think i know what you are saying--it's the same position Cheung was telling me about in the Peter Gade web site. Yodums, I still use the V grip, since it's so easy to change to the backhand grip. There's no fatal weakness with what i'm doing right now. When I use the forehand grip, I can only drop or slice, since I can't generate power with it to drive or clear. If i switch to the forehand grip while moving towards the bird, then i'm committing myself to a slice or drop. If I use the universal grip, i can do slice or drop fine, but can also clear or drive as well so it's easier to use deception there. I do notice a better feeling with the forehand grip for slices and drops, but the small advantage isn't worth the downside for me right now.
That's a pretty tough call, I know lots of very good players who still use the V grip. My personal opinion is that you should change grip forehand and backhand at least, but I wouldn't say someone purely using V grip is wrong just because I don't use it anymore. To BRL: If you aren't comfortable with forehand grip for all your shots that's okay. The worst thing you can do is change your grip/preparation when smashing/dropping/driving/clearing since that lets your opponent read your shot. I used to have this really bad habit that when moving to the backhand corner for clears/smashes/drives I'd use proper footwork, but for drops I'd just jog backwards. Didn't even notice till my coach pointed it out to me, luckily at the time my opponents weren't good enough to read the play that well.
This is a very good point, BRL. Not many books describe grips well. I think one common denominator of all grips is that the handle should be held mainly between thumb and fingers during preparation of the shot if one wants to maximise the potential options. Note that this doesn't contradict Pecheur's statement. If you look at this picture and the position of the racquet, I think it is impossible to reach that position of the racquet and the wrist/forearm without holding the hadnle in the fingers.
this may not be related to anything on this post but similar...holding the grip higher on the handle (handle meets shaft) that give more power or what? i find i can hit it higher and harder with my hand closer to the bottom. how you hold your racquets??
try searching for "choking the cone"... you'll get tons of hits. Or choke or choking etc etc. like this one http://badmintonforum.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=5589
