How close am I to having Taufik's backhand?

it s just my 2 cents. You are still way way behind to where you want to be. Need to work on more technique, footwork, placement, and so on. I wonder how well could you do with a drill like forehand clear and backhand clear side to side. It is like randomly backhand hit with full power. You could do that all day, but most importantly focus on your footwork. You could be hard backhand smasher, but without the correct footwork approaching , you wont be able to perform it.

 

If you ask me, technique is everything. Granted, your backhand here generates power but the real question is how do you apply that kind of stroke in a real match under pressure? It only works because you are static here and in the middle of the court but the goal of doing drills is to apply the technique later on during a match.

Did you ever manage to play this kind of backhand in a match situation? Such as when you are at the forehand front corner playing a net shot for example and the opponent send the shuttle in your deep backhand corner? There is no way you have time to position yourself like you do in the video above and catch the shuttle at this angle from the back of the court.

Nothing to compare to Taufik Hidayat here. (Not trying to be offending just answering to the title of your thread)

You want to generate more power but for what purpose? If you can't apply it in match that's useless.

 

IMO you practise a bad habit for a lazy shot = which a backhand shot never ever is. You really don't need to take anything behind you or on your level. It's infront of you, center-midcourt! Let's imagine you stand mid court center, have plenty of time to go for the forehand. Jumping in with around the head is more effective and serious more deadly. In a real match situation you will be trained to go for the backhand in unnecessary situations instead of the forehand.

Your feeder also feed you with cork facing you, hitting a droping shuttle backhand is a different story. Moving to such a shuttle under pressure and out of center is IMO the key.

My suggestion for the drill: Hitting backhand stroke in the deep corner after you played a forehand netshot. This will force you to move and be in trouble to justify using the backhand. Stick with clear and cross court clear to get out of trouble. Backhand smash is a fancy shot, I sometimes use it in XD, but not very frequent and often.

 

Visiting this thread, requesting clarification or further elaboration on this part. Thanks.

 

Thought you can generate power with bruteforce in badminton, really powerful shots are a result of good technique. The basic idea about power generation in badmintion (and lot of other sports) is the use of a kinetic chains, where power is build up by a large chain of muscle activation, each step build up on the power generates by previous steps and add some more to it. The timing of the activation is the real art, the real skill you need to accomplish.

 

One of the most powerful backhand videos I have ever seen is https: (slash slash ) www.youtube.com(slash)watch?v=KQqo2uTRMrg he had some requests to see if he could hit a shuttle beyond the length of the court, so standing outside the court and hitting it to outside the court, and he made a video of himself doing just that.

I think this is clearly a much better demonstration of a powerful backhand than people that make videos like yours of themselves standing midcourt. Also, as you say you were in a small hall, so maybe you need a bigger hall, also, I think if a 'hall' is very small, the shuttle will fly faster.

 

Regarding power compared to Taufik, it is quite simple - can you play a full court backhand cross-court (high) clear from a late (low) position i.e. full stretch lunge towards the backhand rearcourt? Many people (myself included) can barely to this on the forehand side, let alone backhand.

Regarding technique and being 'lazy' with your practice - it is absolutely relevant when talking about power generation. @ucantseeme is saying the midcourt position and feed you receive results in a good powered backhand smash from you, but that if you moved around the head, you could almost certainly get more power...so why would you bother going backhand unless you are lazy?

If you were to receive a feed where you play a forehand net shot, and your feeder plays it to your backhand rearcourt as a flat lift/drive, then you're not going to be playing backhand smashes any time, as it is not a realistic shot from such a position. However, you could conceivably play a straight/crosscourt clear. You say that your arm doesn't magically stop working by changing your location on court, but it does - taking a shuttle 1 ft off the ground (which is more realistic than taking a high clear to your backhand corner as a backhand) makes it pretty difficult to have your racquet perpendicular to the ground, which is what you do for a backhand smash. Whether you can achieve the power to make the crosscourt clear travel high and far enough having just moved from the forehand forecourt, twisting in the opposite direction and twisting back (which tends to disorientate people somewhat), is the big question.

What we're saying is that Taufik can do it- we have ample video evidence of his miraculous crosscourt clears taken 1 ft above the floor, whilst he is almost diving into the backhand corner. But we can't see you do that, because you're just standing in the middle of the court. Unfortunately, we can't don't have a video of Taufik doing a backhand smash from midcourt, because as we mentioned above, it's not a realistic shot.

We're not saying your backhand stroke is good or bad, because we simply can't tell

 

That looks a bit silly too isn't it? I mean the player is already in position to receive the backhand in a footwork/body position you wouldn't encounter during a match. Besides I wouldn't call it one of the most powerful backhand.

There is this guy too on YouTube (video below) who proposes to explain his secret technique behind his backhands and how he break rackets as his backhand swing are so powerful... but here again we have a player standing still not even remotely in a position / situation that resembles anything you would encounter during a badminton match let alone suggests to perform a backhand instead of a forehand stroke.

It might flatters some egos for whatever reasons (like stringing at 37lbs) but it's unlike anything that can realistically be applied in badminton. Unless this backhand thing is about to be what the long drive variation is to golf then it's another sport.

 

Pretty sure Taufik is double-jointed in his wrist or something cus other pros don't even come close to his backhand

 

Suppose somebody can self feed and do a backhand the length of the court. That's a very hard thing to do. Do you really think that such a demonstration demonstrates nothing related to badminton because it's unrealistic. The footwork to get to a backhand is not rocket science. The part people struggle with most is not the footwork getting to it, but getting the shuttle to go the distance. If somebody can do that, and they have played badminton for years and even coach, then I think they can do the footwork to get to the backhand prior to hitting it that well.

If somebody lifted it to them and they moved to it in a realistic way, you could still say ah it's unrealistic because they fed it to them. And you'd want to see it in a game. But any coach knows that what a person can do when fed a shuttle can strongly relate to what they can do in a game . There are varying degrees of realism in these artificial practise scenarios. But if you're going to say sorry the person didn't move to hit it... Would you have been impressed if you had seen them move to it and hit it from end to end? Probably not.. But I think it's pretty obvious they can move to it. The point is they did the really hard bit. (which is the last movement part). And in most clubs, there might only be one person in the whole club that can do that, if that. Getting the distance on a backhand clear is something people often struggle with most and most never achieve. They don't struggle with getting to it They might often get to it but never ever get the distance. . I don't understand why you think it's no big deal. Also these guys aren't all claiming to do a backhand like taufik (and even that claim would be a bit ambiguous 'cos are they talking about the backhand clear or the backhand stretched out low).. You could have a club of 30 players many of them playing for over a decade, and it may be only one of them can hit it end to end if that.. many clubs have more than 30 players and nobody can.. So we're talking < 4% of players. (and a much higher percentage can at least get the footwork to get to it, but are limited to a backhand drop because they lack the power.. so to suggest the demo shows nothing related to badminton because it doesn't show the footwork movement moving diagonally back prior to stepping out to the side), , seems strange to me.. I'm not impressed by the footwork movement, any tom or harry can do that, i'm impressed by the length from the hit. And I do think that would translate in a game! Maybe not every time and maybe not against a national level player, but I think these guys's backhand ability would translate in a game.
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That jay lopez / mr backhand guy is a bit of a comedian with some of his comments on videos of other people with good technique.. But there's no question he has a decent backhand, Here he is in a game situation I think he does 2 backhand clears in the video, timeframe is the minute from 12:00-13:00 https://www(dot)youtube.com(slash)watch?v=2GBjTyPJEUQ And it doesn't surprise me that he can do it in a game. when a person has shown videos of them doing it when fed to them.

 

Alright. Say you bring that player in the video you posted at his forehand front corner to play at the net then push him to his deep backhand corner. If footwork is not rocket science and something no one struggles with, he should have the time to place himself like he does in the video and performs his backhand the same way without any problems?

Yet even LCW couldn't place himself like that if he wanted to. You can only position yourself like the player in the video you showed if you stay static waiting for the shuttle at the back of the court. When coming from the forehand part of the court or even from your base position, no way you can hit the shuttle with this angle and this position. Thus why footwork might not be rocket science I agree but I totally disagree on the part you say "The part people struggle with most is not the footwork getting to it, but getting the shuttle to go the distance."

If people can't easily get the distance on backhand stroķes it's mostly because of positioning. If everyone could have the time to place themselves so perfectly before the shuttle arrives, they could have more chance to properly execute their backhand and clear the distance. But if you can position yourself like that during a match it's mid court only (like the OP) and you should do a RTH forehand stroke then. That's why I think those backhands are not applied in a realistic match situation. Just my thoughts anyway. I don't mind players filming themselves doing those backhands and posting it on social media to discuss the power they generate. I'm simply saying you won't do that in a match.

 

What about doubles?

 

Your backhand seems pretty good in power. As for how it can be more powerful, perhaps muscle training and using racket as heavy as possible while still maintaining maximum swing speed. Although I do not recommend focusing in this area, it is what you asked.

 

You'll notice there are much less backhands strokes being played in doubles. Because players would never perform a backhand stroke when they have enough time to do a forehand stroke, more powerful and faster to recover from in order to be ready to smash again for example. In short if you have time to be positioned behind the shuttle (ie all the backhand videos of this thread) you should actually perform a forehand stroke. Backhand are supposed to be a kind of last minute resort when a player is under high pressure and have no other choice of stroke. Backhands will never be as powerful and efficient in term of recovery time than forehand strokes. That's why I believe those videos are not realistically applied in a real badminton match situation.

And between us... posting your backhand strokes and asking how close is it to Taufik or posting videos on YouTube precising you string at 37lbs and break rackets (the video of Mr Bakchand I posted in which I dig in a bit more, well turns out he actually buy fake rackets so surely they are not as sturdy as the original ones so Mr Bachkand sure breaks rackets but there is another reason why) is more for the fun. It is players who use social media for a purpose, such as to get popular, more clicks, etc. They tap in a sensitive subject in badminton because it makes so many players fantasize! Like who got the biggest backhand and how to do backhands that break rackets! There is a wow factor. Again it's fine and fun to watch but it doesn't seems to me it's applicable for competitive badminton players. I guess we would see some pros doing that sort of backhand otherwise too.

 

I'm not the OP!

 

Haha I know! Language issue here I was not thinking straight... my apologies. In my native tongue when we want to generalize we don't say: "when one eats too much, he gains weight" instead we use you even if we don't refer to the person directly or anyone in particular. That looks like that "when you eat too much you gain weight".

 

Well, saying "one" is a bit posh, thee are a number of alternatives in English, Google suggests that in french you have some words for "somebody" e.g. "when somebody posts their" or "joe blogs" or "a guy" or "a person".

i've been in a situation where somebody was saying to me "When you [insert terrible thing here]" and he's getting very emphatic and pointing and shouting, but talking about somebody else or talking generally, and people are turning around thinking he's talking about me!