Badminton

The Service Court
The service court is divided in two parts. In the middle of the court there is a net, which is 1.55 meters high. The short service lines go away 1.98 meters from the net. Left service court and right service court are divided by the centre line.

Service court for singles - 5.18 meters by 13.40 meters long
Service court for doubles - 6.10 meters wide by 11.88 meters long.

Badminton racquets
Traditionally racquets were made of wood. Later on aluminium or other light metals became the material of choice. Now, almost all professional badminton racquets are composed of carbon fiber composite (graphite reinforced plastic).

Playing the game
Each player or pair takes position on either side of a net on a rectangular court marked on the floor, as shown in the diagrams.

The object of the game is to hit a "birdie", using a racquet, over the net onto the court within the marked boundaries before the opposing player or pair can hit it back. For every time this is achieved by the team currently serving, the serving player or pair scores one point. After winning a point the same player serves again, and continues to serve as long as they continue to win points. If the non-serving team wins the rally, no point is scored but instead there is a change of server.

(In doubles, one server starts the game, and after losing a rally the serve switches to the opposing team. From then on, both players on a team take turns serving before the serve switches back to their opponents. The player on the right-hand serving side always begins the serving.)

At the beginning of the game the birdie must be thrown on the net. The movement of the birdie's top settles who of the players has the right to serve.

The first player or pair to reach 15 points (11 points for women's singles) wins the game. If the score reaches 14-all (10-all for women's singles) the receiving side can choose to "set" and hence extend the game by 3 points, i.e. the first to reach 17 (or 13) points wins. If the non-serving side chooses not to set, the game is decided by a single point, i.e. the first to reach 15 (or 11) points wins. A badminton match can be made up of any odd number of games (usually 3). The winner of the match is the first to win more than half the number of games (e.g. the first to win 3 games in a 5 game match).