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I haven’t posted in two weeks, so here are some updates regarding the Wednesday badminton session that JP and I go to. Last week there was a lot of people showed up, so that made for some interesting match ups. JP and I won our first two games pretty easily, but we were soundly defeated in the third game. This was because I was starting to run out of gas, and because that I made a lot of unforced errors in the latter part of the game. We immediately requested a rematch with our opponents. The fourth game was very close, but because of my waning strength our opponents managed to get to 14 points first. However, they made some mistakes and we capitalized to force the extra three points. Unfortunately, I was really out of breath at that point and we ended up losing 14-17. For the fifth game, we were matched up against a different pair of opponents. Our opponents were still pretty skilled, but they weren’t as good as our previous opponents, and so JP and I managed to get the win. For the last game of the night, JP and I were matched another skilled pair of opponents. At that point I was so tired I could barely run, and therefore despite my hardest efforts we fell 9-15 to our opponents. At the end of the night, JP and I finished with a 3-3 record. It was a pretty tough night for me, and after that Wednesday night I ended up feeling sore for the following Thursday and Friday.
This Wednesday less people showed up for the badminton session, and unlike last week JP and I pretty much just bowled over the competition. We played five games in total and the closest game was 15-5. Granted, this week’s opponents weren’t that strong, but I was in pretty good form this Wednesday, so that might have something to do with our wins.
After playing on Wednesday for a month or so, I think I’ve discovered a pattern to how I usually perform. On Wednesdays, the most important game for me is probably the third game, as this is usually when my initial reserve of strength runs out. I find that if I win the third game then I stand a pretty good chance winning the rest of the games. If I lose the third game however then it might be a long night. This doesn’t really apply to my Sunday sessions, since we play 21 point games on Sundays and those games are usually a lot shorter in duration.
The final thing to mention is that the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics have started. Being Chinese myself, I’m proud that my home country is hosting the games. Sports that I will try to keep an eye on are basketball, athletics (running mostly), gymnastics, swimming, and diving. As for badminton, unfortunately the broadcaster in Canada doesn’t carry any of the badminton matches, despite the fact that a lot of Canadian play badminton themselves. I guess JP and I will have to find some other sources to watch Olympic badminton.