By Rishabh@thesport

Imagine an object traveling at 493 kilometres per hour, striking your body and you not getting intimidated by it. It is by far the fastest racket sport existing. Over an hour of an enthralling match with you on your feet every moment, swinging your racket, smashing the ball at high speed, playing each stroke beautifully and earning each point. My hobby is playing badminton for at least 3 hours a day.

Everyone may not agree with my opinion, but the reason why I believe this, is because of the pace at which the sport is played at. Usually a match is of 3 games of 21 points each. There is no time limit for a match as rallies can be really long. The longest rally ever played has been over the whopping 200 shot mark in doubles and in singles the record is set at 108 shots! To play this sport one need a lot of stamina to last out all throughout the match.

If you want to play this sport, all you need is a racket and a birdie(also known as shuttlecock.) Moreover, if you start playing badminton, it is going to be very addicting as it is a fun game to play. However, the reason why I chose to play badminton was different. I always used to only watch and not play. In this process, I had my personal favourite-Lee Chong Wei! Watching him play was an absolute delight. Despite being the oldest player on the circuit he is the fittest. Since then, badminton is my life.

Badminton gives you many real life skills such as patience and the never say die attitude. For any sport, skills like speed, strength, accuracy, stamina and agility are required and badminton is just the right sport which provides you these key skills. Today’s leading young players include Viktor Axelsen, Kento Momota, Chou Tien Chen, Tia Tzu Ying, Akane Yamaguchi, Ratchanok Intanon, Nozomi Okuhara, PV Sindhu and Saina Nehwal.

While badminton is my passion,I continue to hone my skills in the sport.Lin Dan, the two time Olympic gold medalist and five time world champion always believes in his saying:‘I am clean, I support sportsmanship, I love badminton.’

This is about my hobby what’s yours?

Rishabh Jain, 10B