Hey, fellow badminton player, it’s been a long time since I last posted here on Get Good At Badminton. I actually took a trip to Changsha, Hunan. I had the opportunity to experience a badminton training program in China for three weeks. Now that I’m back in Canada, it’s time for me to share what I learned in China and give you an in-depth training guide to help you get good at badminton.
Badminton training in China was tough, really tough. I was training with a bunch of high school students, and it was completely different from what high school students do in Canada.
We were basically training like full-time professional badminton players even though the group I trained with was nowhere near the Chinese national level.
Here’s our weekly and daily schedule.
Badminton Training Program General Structure
In China, we trained five days a week with two 2-hour sessions every day, except for Thursday. Here’s what it generally looked like:
Monday:
- 9:00-11:00 Badminton Training On Court
- 3:00-5:00 Weight Training And Conditioning
Tuesday:
- 9:00-11:00 Badminton Training On Court
- 3:00-5:00 Badminton Training On Court
Wednesday:
- 9:00-11:00 Badminton Training On Court
- 3:00-5:00 Weight Training And Conditioning
Thursday:
- 9:00-11:00 Badminton Training On Court
- 3:00-5:00 Rest
Friday:
- 9:00-11:00 Badminton Training On Court
- 3:00-5:00 Weight Training And Conditioning
Every morning and Tuesday afternoons, we spent our time on the court doing badminton drills. This involved things like multi-feed drills aimed at improving our consistency, quality of our shots, and game sense. I will go deeper into what exercises we actually did in the next section.
In the afternoons, except Tuesday and Thursday, we did weight training and conditioning. These sessions were aimed at building endurance and strength, which is why none of the top players in my group looked like high school students and, instead, looked like pro athletes.
For most people, the time between 11:00 AM and 3:00 PM was spent by eating lunch and then napping. This is how players in my group replenish their energy and recover despite training every day.
Unfortunately, the home I stayed at was way too far from the place I trained, so I often spent 
time browsing the mall or taking short naps on random benches and seats. I was always a little tired before each weight training and conditioning session.
Training like this had tremendous results, though. My quality of shot, consistency, and stamina all improved tremendously.
When I came back to Canada and trained at my usual club, I was noticeably more explosive on the court and played with a lot more speed and power.
You can receive these benefits too… without spending a few thousand dollars to go train in a foreign country because I’m going to share all the drills and exercises I did in China here in this blog post.
Badminton Drills And Exercises
The badminton drills and exercises I did in the Chinese badminton training program were fairly standard. We had various two-on-one, one-on-one, and multi-feed drills that were always designed to improve a particular aspect of play.
Drop Shot And Clearing Drills
I remember going back to the badminton training program in China, the coach focused a lot on drop shots and clears. He was focused on controlling play and pushing people around the court.
We were doing lots of two-on-one and one-on-one drills where players were only allowed to play drop shots, clears, net shots, and lifts. You could play drop shots, clears, and net shots anywhere. However, drive shots, push shots, smashes, and net kills were forbidden.
These drills were particularly tiring because they forced you to play longer rallies and move around more.
There are some variations of this drill as well. Sometimes, one person was not allowed to drop, which allowed him to be pressured more as longer rallies are forced.
Other times, one player was only allowed to drop allowing him to develop his drop shot better. Sometimes there were patterns built in to build anticipation skills correctly.
Generally, these drills were timed. Usually, each player will play for 10-minutes.
Two-On-One Attack Defense Drill
I talked about this drill a few times in the GGAB Fitness Training Regime across several days.
This drill is when one player can either play any shot or is limited on what he can play, depending on whether he’s practicing attack or defense.
Let’s look at attack first.
When the one player is practicing attack, he can play any shot. The two defenders, however, cannot play push shots, smashes, or net kills.
When the one player is practicing defense, the exact opposite happens. He cannot play push shots, smashes, or net kills, but the two players can play anything.
We did this drill a few times. It’s really good at developing your game sense.
This one was the same as the drop shot and clearing drills where we practiced about 10-minutes for each person.
Multi Shuttle Feeding Drills
We did lots of multi shuttle feeding drills in our badminton training program in China. To do these drills, you will have someone hitting or throwing shuttles to various locations. At the same time, the player on the other side will respond depending on the drill. There were different kinds of drills we did which I will list down here:
- Random
- Defense
- Smash Net Kill
- Net Shots
Let’s start with the random multi shuttle feeding drill.
Random Multi Shuttle Feeding Drills
Like the name suggests, both the feeder and worker will hit shuttles entirely randomly. This builds reaction time and footwork speed.
Both the feeder and worker should do their best to replicate a real game situation through the drills. Keep things fast-paced, but not to the point where the worker can’t handle it.
In China, we did 1 set of 40, 1 set of 60, and then 1 set of 80 if we were focusing on building stamina or 3 sets of 20 to replicate a real game rally.
Defense Multi Shuttle Drill
One of the drills I had never experienced before China was a drill that specifically trained defensive court movements.
This drill consists of the feeder standing on the same side as the worker tossing shuttles in various locations and the worker responding. These tosses will imitate drops, smashes, and push shots forcing the worker to get low and move fast like they’re playing defense.
Generally, we did 5 sets of 20 for this drill.
Smash Net Kill Drill
Again, as the name suggests, this drill is focused on improving your smash and net kill. It also enhances your attacking footwork as in a game, after a smash, you will often be moving towards the front of the court.
With this drill, the feeder will hit the shuttle to the back and then hit it to the front after the worker smashes. Then repeat.
This is what the worker should be doing: Smash, net kill, smash, net kill, smash, net kill, smash, net kill, etc.
Again, 5 sets of 20 for this drill was what we did.
Net Shot Drill
When we are close to the end of our sessions, we always like to do a little bit of cooldown drills, such as playing net shots. This drill is effortless to do.
The feeder will stand on one side of the net and throw shuttles over like a net shot or drop, and the worker will play a net shot back. It’s about practicing racket control and improving the quality of your net shots.
Players can also improve other shots at the net as well, like cross-court net shots, lifts, and flicks. It’s entirely up to you. There are no harsh restrictions. Thus, there isn’t really a set amount that you should do either.
Playing Badminton Games Drill
Occasionally, we also get drills where we are allowed to perform any type of shot at any time. The exercise is basically, “Play a regular match without the points.”
In a way, it’s not really a drill, but I’m just going to include it here as it’s not exactly the same as formal matches. For these drills, it’s the same as the two-on-one drills. Do them for about ten minutes per person.
Weight Training Like A Pro
The thing that differs high school badminton in China from high school badminton in Canada is weight training and conditioning. Before experiencing my badminton training program in China, I had hardly ever lifted weights before.
Most of the time, there wasn’t a disciplined workout. We were left to whatever we felt like doing. Here are some weight training exercises that we commonly did:
- Bench press
- Overhead press
- Bentover row
- One arm row
- Bicep curls
- Squats with kettleball
- Squat jumps with kettleball
- Calf raises with weights
- Lunges with weights
- One leg lunges
- Wall sits
- Crunches with weights
- Wrist curls
- Arm flicks
- Core rotations
- Leg extensions
Usually, we did whatever we felt like. Everyone is a little different and adjusted depending on what and how much they could do.
There was one day where we had a high-intensity interval training (HIIT) session with weights. Try it if you’re up to the challenge. Don’t get hurt, though!
HIIT Weight Training
One day, one of our coaches prepared various stations in which we took a place in. At each station, there was a different exercise. We start at any station and do the exercise for 25 seconds as fast as we can and then rotate. Then we do the next exercise for 25 seconds and keep rotating until we come back to the station we started at. Then after a 1-minute break, do another rotation. Do this 8 times.
Here are the exercises:
- Overhead press (5 kg on each side)
- Bicep curl (7.5 kg on each side)
- Crunches with weights (7.5 kg)
- Arm flicks (7.5 kg)
- Leg extension (40 kg)
- Core rotation (7.5 kg)
- Squat jumps with kettleball (30 kg)
It’s incredibly tiring. My left arm was rendered completely useless for three days after doing this. The key is to go as fast as you can for each exercise and strictly maintain the breaks at 1-minute.
Badminton Conditioning In China
Weight training usually lasted for 1 hour. For the last hour left in our training sessions, we ran.
It often varied depending on the coach and the day. For example, on the day that we did HIIT weight training, our coach only had us run 4 laps of 200 meters.
Since it was never the same and often changed around, I will give you a few examples that you could try.
- 1 lap of 400m, 1 lap of 800m, 1 lap of 1200m, 1 lap of 1600m, 1 lap of 2000m
- 1 lap of 6000m
- 45-minute timed run
The first example is the hardest run. Each run will force you to change your pace while the other two examples are super easy once you find your own pace. I highly recommend giving the first example a try.
Now You Have The Badminton Training Program, Execute
I gave you a whole Chinese training regime that cost me over $2,000 for free. You know precisely what you have to do to get good at badminton. The question is, “Will you do it?”
I hope you enjoyed today’s article on a badminton training program in China. If you have any questions or comments, make sure you leave them down below! As always, good luck in your games and have a great day!
thank you for your sharing.I am a badminton coach of Chinese training agencies,and i am looking for the informations like what you shared above,My goal is to be a bilingual badminton coach in China.Welcome the coach who could teach in English to talk to me
Awesome! Good luck on your goals 🙂
Dear Miss/Mr
My name is PAMELA GANDARIA BISRI, I’m a former badminton athlete from Indonesia and I’m taking the liberty to contact you to apply for a job as badminton coach at your club. I have participated very successfully (You can find in my CV the detail of my achievements as players) to competition in Indonesia and in Europe. I played in the European league as professional player for clubs in Sweden and in the Nederland and I trained as sparring partner in Belgium, Japan and Indonesia.
During my previous experience in Europe, I have particularly enjoyed working in a very professional and open minded environment and this is the reason why I would like now to move permanently in your country and use my years of experience in Indonesia as professional player to contribute to the development of Badminton in your country and in your club in particular.
My passion is to guide and develop players to improve their game and level in full respect of their own pace, motivation and ambition. I always advise my students based on a text-book approach that is critical to build and improve their game.
As a coach, my desire is to transmit my passion with Badminton to motivated students within a well-organized structure having already strong foundation in terms of teaching methods and equipment. No matters the level of ambition of my students is, from playing badminton as an active leisure to intensive players looking for achieving top performance, I will always adapt my approach to their needs and make sure that they have fun and satisfaction on what they will accomplish.
My fulfillment would be to see the players (of all ages and ability) I help in their journey, improving their game and achieving their personal goals.
If your club is looking to a highly motivated international top-class badminton coach to support the development of your players, I would be delighted to get the chance to speak with you so we can discuss how my personality, skills and experience could help you in achieving the vision and objectives of your club.
PUPIN PAMELA GANDARIA BISRI
Email : [email protected]
Date of birth : 16 April 1988
Place of birth : Bandung
National : Indonesia
Visa Status : Employment Pass
Sex : Female
Marital status : Single
Work Position : Professional Badminton Coach
Previous Club : SGS ( Sangkuriang Graha Sarana ) Club
Language : Indonesia & English
My passion is to guide and develop players to improve their game and level in full respect of their own pace, motivation and ambition. I always advise my students based on a text-book approach that is critical to build and improve their game.
As a coach, my desire is to transmit my passion with Badminton to motivated students within a well-organized structure having already strong foundation in terms of teaching methods and equipment. No matters the level of ambition of my students is, from playing badminton as an active leisure to intensive players looking for achieving top performance, I will always adapt my approach to their needs and make sure that they have fun and satisfaction on what they accomplish.
My fulfillment would be to see the players (of all ages and ability) I help in their journey, improving their game and achieving their personal goals.
SKILLS / SELF ACHIEVEMENTS
– 1994 – 2000 : Start Playing Badminton at age of 6 years old with Sangkuriang Graha Sarana (SGS) Bandung
– 2000 – 2008 : Training Under LIPPO Bank West Java
ACHIEVEMENT AS BADMINTON PLAYER
– 1999 :
⮚ Champion Women Single Junior School, Bandung – Indonesia
– 2001 :
⮚ Champion Women Single Double Winer U-13 and U-15, Sampurna Remaja Cup Sumedang – Indonesia
⮚ Champion Women Single U-13 Sangkuriang Cup, Cimahi – Indonesia
⮚ Champion Women Single U-13 Walikota Cup, Bandung – Indonesia
– 2002 :
⮚ Champion Women Single U-15 Walikota, Bandung – Indonesia
⮚ Champion Women Single U-15 BM77 BigPro, Bandung – Indonesia
– 2003 :
⮚ Champion Women Single U-15 Bumi Siliwangi Cup Bandung – Indonesia
– 2004 :
⮚ Champion Women Single U-17 Bumi Siliwangi Cup, Bandung – Indonesia
⮚ Champion Women Single U-17 KOTAB – WALIKOTA CUP, Bandung – Indonesia ⮚ Semi Finalist Women Single U-17 Circuit National, Tegal – Indonesia
– 2005 :
⮚ Champion Women Single U-17 Walikota Cup, Bandung – Indonesia
⮚ Semi Finalist Women Double U-17 Walikota Cup, Surabaya – Indonesia National Level ⮚ Runner up National Junior school Team competition Medan – Indonesia
– 2006 :
⮚ Champion Women Single U-18 National Level, Denpasar Bali – Indonesia
⮚ Semi Finalist Mix Double U-17 National Level, Tasik – Indonesia
⮚ Semi Finalist Women Single and Double U-17 Kejurda, Tasik – Indonesia
⮚ Semi Finalist Team Competition Porda Senior Level, Karawang – Indonesia
⮚ Semi Finalist Women Sigle and double U-17 Siliwangi-Samsung-Sgs Elekrik National Level, Bandung – Indonesia
⮚ Semi Finalist Women Single U-17 Kejurda, Bandung – Indonesia
⮚ Semi Finalist Women Double U-17 Walikota Surabaya National Level, Surabaya – Indonesia Professional Badminton Player For INVICTUS Holland (Netherland) – Played Team Competitions for the Club Badminton League
⮚ Runner Up Belgium Junior Open
– 2007-2008 :
⮚ Professional Badminton Player for IFK Umea SWEDEN (uMea) Runner Up – Played Team Competition Sweden League For the Club Badminton League
– 2009 :
⮚ Semi Finalist Women Single Djarum Arena Open, Cirebon – Indonesia
COACHING EXPERIENCE
– 2005 :
⮚ Sparing Partner for Badminton Club in JAPAN
– 2006 :
⮚ Sparing Partner for Badminton Player in Belgium
– 2008-2012:
⮚ Coaching in Sangkuriang Graha Sarana (SGS) Bandung – Indonesia
– 2019-2020:
⮚ Coach player in India
That’s wonderful, Pamela. Unfortunately, I do not own a badminton club yet. If you’re specifically looking to come coach in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, I can direct you to some clubs. I do believe Canada does have an NCCP you’ll have to go through if coaching in Canada is something you would like to do.
Hey, I require foreign coach in my academy here in delhi
Hi Naman, unfortunately, I don’t know of anyone who can help. All the best on your search!
Hi, may i know what is an arm flick?
Hi Ernest, admittedly I don’t know what they are actually called. To perform an arm flick, you start by holding a weight with both your hands behind your head. Then you lift the weight above your head. You should notice your arms extend straight upwards. After you lift the weight above your head, you can bring it back behind your head again. That would be one rep. I called it an arm flick because as you make these movements repeatedly, it looks and feels like you’re flicking your arms. Hope that helps!
Hi, would you please share the contact details of the training center in Hunan where you trained and if you could provide a rough estimate of the expenses you’ve had. Thanks!
I played at a school called Hunan Guangyi Experimental middle school in Changsha. Training costs are about $500 CAD for two weeks and you do have to be fluent in Mandarin as there are no translators. Unfortunately, I do not have any direct contact info as I got in through my uncle.
I want some schedules for beginners to develop badminton my mail id is [email protected].
Kindly share and help me
For beginners, it’s really about developing their fundamental technique. I would implement two-hour training schedules where you start with 15-30 minutes of footwork, 30 minutes to an hour of working on basic swings, and the rest of the time for fitness or games. It really depends on the maturity and fitness levels of the students.
Hello,
Thanks for the article! I have a few questions regarding the conditioning. What are the rest times between runs for the badminton conditioning (the first drill)? For the conditioning, are they usually time trials (run as far as you can in the amount of time)? What do you think about replacing running with Hiit cardio (such as insanity)?
I appreciate your help,
Best,
Shariq (trying to go from D bracket to C bracket)
Hi Shariq,
For the rest times between runs for the first conditioning drill, it’s equal to the amount of time it takes to run the lap. On average you will rest between 30 seconds to about 3 minutes depending on how fast you run. Most of the time, we ran based on distance as people tend to slack off in time trials. I really like the idea of incorporating more HIIT into badminton training as it does wonders for improving your stamina for playing fast rallies. Running does do a lot for improving your ability to play long rallies, though, so it’s really up to you depending on what you want to work on. Ideally, doing a bit of both throughout the week is probably the most beneficial.
Hope that helps!
Kevin
Can other country players play in China?
Hi Shreya, other country players can play in China, but finding a training location really comes down to personal connections and that can be difficult if you don’t speak the language. Hope that helps!
Conditioning the 1st example is the hardest according to you. Is that a sprints of 400m 800m 1200m etc or normal running?
Hey Shahid, in the conditioning, you’re generally going as fast as you can. It’s not necessarily a sprint, but you should be running at your fastest pace for each run. Hope that helps!
Thanks bro
You’re welcome!
Hi Kevin.
I would like to send my Indonesian son, 18 years old, to a badminton holiday camp in June 2023 in China. We are living in Bali and he is training badminton, besides school, for 4 years daily.
The goal is to show him some other training methods and to learn to speak some Mandarin.
Could you recommend some badminton school in China?
Thanks very much and best regards
Don
Hey Don,
Thanks for reaching out! Is your son fluent in Mandarin? I, unfortunately, am not super well-connected in China and can only talk about the middle/high school that I played at. Nobody could translate well there, so you really have to be fluent in Mandarin. You could take a look at this program from Badminton Becky, but it sounds like it won’t be ready for 2023: http://www.badmintonbecky.com/badminton-training-camp-in-china/
Best,
Kevin
Hi Kevin.
Thanks for your answer.
My son has learned Mandarin for years at school but never really spoke it. That’s one reason I want to send him there. I think it will be hard at the beginning but then he will adapt very quickly.
I’ve seen Becky’s blog but I would prefer to send him somewhere where he is forced to open up to Mandarin because nobody speaks English.
I will continue my search.
Best regards
D.
Hi D. , did you manage to find a badminton camp in China for your son? I’m looking for the same for my daughter, also with some Mandarin-ability, and is a badminton-nut.
Hello! I recently got into badminton competitively and was looking to improve my game to at least provincial or national level in Canada, specifically Calgary, Alberta. Could you recommend some training methods to help me reach my goal? I am 15 and have most of the shots down. I mainly need to focus on technique as my strength and conditioning are already there through hockey. Are there any clubs you would like in China around Taiyuan? I am fluent in Chinese and looking to go there during the summer to train full-time. tHank you so much for your time!
Hey Jeffery, very cool that you’re playing badminton in Calgary as I live in Calgary myself. Unfortunately, I don’t know of any clubs around Taiyuan. Which badminton club do you train at? I might know some other people you could ask.
I just started training at Drive Sports, any recommendations on a routine to improve to provincial level fast? Trying to achieve this by the end of August! Thank you so much for the quick reply!
That’s awesome, I train at DriveSports too. Try to get in touch with Coach Huang about training in China as he’s well-connected. You can try the training routine in this article as any training program in an Asian country will be very similar; just adjust it as you see fit. In general, training two times a day (one fitness, one badminton), six times a week consistently will get you very good very fast.
I am finding training badminton club in China for my girl 0n16 year . Who can introduce me?
Hi Lin, what is her skill level? For example, does she compete provincially/nationally or internationally, or just starting out?
Hi,
I plan to go to china for some traveling and badminton training. I would say I’m above intermediate level and have ambition to play pro.
I will be based in gz for a few months and travel up north for a few months.
Do you have any recommendations on where I can find a badminton training camp in gz for 2-3 months? Also other province you would recommend to travel for badminton?
Just beginning my lite research at the moment!
Cheers!
Hello, I’m not super well-connected so unfortunately I don’t have many recommendations. When I went to China, however, my uncle connected directly with a high school where I trained at. I find that is a pretty good option.
Best,
Kevin
Hello, i will like to send my daughters’ 15 and 13 years old in a good badminton academy. Europe, india or china.. the latter is my first choice as china seems the best so far. But training looks tough! Can you send me some contacts of the academies as i cannot find any online.. thx
Hello, unfortunately I don’t really have direct contacts as I found the high school through my uncle in China. How are your daughters’ abilities to speak Mandarin?
Hi, they know some basic words in mandarin. But can soeak English and french.
Okay, that might be difficult. This is the school I trained at if you want to check it out, but that’s about my limits currently and unfortunately none of them speak fluent English: China, Hunan, Changsha, Yuhua District, Changsha, 古曲路古曲南路179 邮政编码: 410019
Hi Kevin,
I suggest that you please avoid starting your sentences with a negative connotation of “Unfortunately.” If you are in the blogging business, try to provide empathetic responses to your audience.
That said, I enjoyed reading your post and appreciate the badminton info you shared with fellow badminton enthusiasts.
Thank you for commenting!