what year did badminton become an olympic sport

From Town & Land

Badminton is an ancient game but it'due south only been an Olympic sport since 1992, and its road to the Games was a long and winding one. If you've just seen this game played on a summertime lawn (possibly drink in hand) then y'all're missing out on the strange beauty of a very serious pastime.

The sport's roots are more than 2,000 years old.

Badminton has its roots in a very onetime game called battledore and shuttlecock, played by ancient civilizations in Eurasia. Much like the current game, information technology involved two people hitting a shuttlecock (a projectile with a lot of drag, often fabricated from a cork and feathers) dorsum and forth with 2 bats and trying to keep information technology from striking the basis.

It became an upper-class pastime in the 1800s.

English officers in British-controlled Republic of india discovered a game in that location called Poon, which was like battledore and shuttlecock with the addition of a internet. They took it dorsum to England with them, where the Knuckles of Beaufort introduced it to his guests at his Gloucestershire dwelling house, "Badminton."

The offset tournament was held in 1898.

Played in the English town of Guilford, the All England Open Badminton Championships withal take identify today. Initially merely doubles teams competed; singles matches were added in 1900.

The United States and the residue of the world took detect in the 1930s.

The International Badminton Federation was formed in 1934; the beginning member countries included England, Wales, Republic of ireland, Scotland, Denmark, Holland, Canada, New Zealand, and France. India joined equally an chapter in 1936.

Badminton became a Republic Games Sport in 1966.

Kingston, Jamaica was the host metropolis that year, and it'south been in the games (held every 4 years) ever since.

But it took until 1992 for it to become a sport at the Olympic Games.

After beingness a demonstration sport at the 1972 Games in Munich, singles and doubles badminton was introduced in Barcelona in 1992. Mixed doubles came four years later in Atlanta. China, Denmark, India, Republic of indonesia, Nippon, Korea, Malaysia, and Russian federation take won medals in the sport and so far. Communist china has dominated, having won 38 medals (16 of them gilt); South Korea and Indonesia have won 18 medals each.

At the London Games in 2012, the sport was plagued by controversy.

Four women'south doubles teams from three countries-China, Republic of korea, and Indonesia-were disqualified for deliberately losing matches to rig the round robin draw (officials accused them of "not using all-time efforts" and "conducting oneself in a way that is clearly abusive or detrimental to the sport). China still won gilded in all v categories (men's singles, men'due south doubles, women'due south singles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles).

This twelvemonth'southward American team has the country'due south highest-ranked men'due south singles histrion.

Californian Howard Shu, 26, grew up playing badminton in Anaheim. He was viii years quondam when his father, who played badminton in Taiwan himself, "put a noise in my hands." Joining Shu on the team are Iris Wang (women'south singles), Sattawat Pongnairat and Phillip Chew (equally a men's doubles team), Eva Lee and Paula Lynn Obanana (as a women's doubles team), and Jamie Subandhi (who will play mixed doubles with Chew-marking the get-go time the U.S. will play in that category). Of the grouping, only Lee has competed in the Olympics earlier (in Beijing in 2008).

Fittingly, Brazil will send its commencement team to the Olympic games this summer.

The New York Times recently reported on 19-yr-former Ygor Coelho de Oliveira and xx-year-erstwhile Lohaynny Vicente, a co-ed squad from Rio.