badminton

Badminton is a racquet sport played by either two opposing players (singles) or two opposing pairs (doubles), who take positions on opposite halves of a rectangular court that is divided by a net. Players score points by striking a shuttlecock with their racquet so that it passes over the net and lands in their opponents' half of the court. A rally ends once the shuttlecock has struck the ground, and the shuttlecock may only be struck once by each side before it passes over the net.
The shuttlecock (or shuttle) is a feathered projectile whose unique aerodynamic properties cause it to fly differently from the balls used in most racquet sports; in particular, the feathers create much higher drag, causing the shuttlecock to decelerate more rapidly than a ball. Shuttlecocks have a much higher top speed, when compared to other racquet sports. Because shuttlecock flight is affected by wind, competitive badminton is best played indoors. Badminton is also played outdoors as a casual recreational activity, often as a garden or beach game.

Since 1992, badminton has been an Olympic sport with five events: men's and women's singles, men's and women's doubles, and mixed doubles, in which each pair is a man and a woman. At high levels of play, the sport demands excellent fitness: players require aerobic stamina, agility, strength, speed, and precision. It is also a technical sport, requiring good motor coordination and the development of sophisticated racquet movements.

Badminton has been played since ancient times; an early form of the sport was played in ancient Greece. In Japan, the related game Hanetsukiwas played as early as the 16th century. In the west, badminton came from a game called battledore and shuttlecock, in which two or more players keep a feathered shuttlecock in the air with small racquets.The modern form of Badminton however can be traced to India, where British military officers stationed there in the late 19th century CE became interested in a similar local game which was known to them as Poona (derived from Pune, an Indian garrison town). This game was taken back to England where the rules of badminton were set out. Another early version of the game was recorded in the 1850s in the southern Indian city of Tanjore, called pooppanthu vilayattam (Tamil for flower-ball game) in which balls made of wool and cardboard were used in the place of the modern-day shuttlecock.

Isaac Spratt, a London toy dealer, published a booklet, "Badminton Battledore - a new game" in 1860, but unfortunately no copy has survived. The new sport was definitively launched in 1873 at the Badminton House, Gloucestershire, owned by the Duke of Beaufort. During that time, the game was referred to as "The Game of Badminton," and the game's official name became Badminton.Until 1887, the sport was played in England under the rules that prevailed in India. The Bath Badminton Club standardized the rules and made the game applicable to English ideas. The basic regulations were drawn up in 1887. In 1893, the Badminton Association of England published the first set of rules according to these regulations, similar to today's rules, and officially launched badminton in a house called "Dunbar" at 6 Waverley Grove, Portsmouth, England on September 13 of that year. They also started the All England Open Badminton Championships, the first badminton competition in the world, in 1899.
The International Badminton Federation (IBF) (now known as Badminton World Federation) was established in 1934 with Canada, Denmark, England, France, the Netherlands, Ireland, New Zealand, Scotland, and Wales as its founding members. India joined as an affiliate in 1936. The BWF now governs international badminton and develops the sport globally.While set-out in England, international badminton has traditionally been dominated by Denmark from Europe. Indonesia, South Korea and Malaysia are among the nations that have consistently produced world-class players in the past few decades and dominated competitions on the international level, with China being the most dominant in recent years

Elephant polo

Elephant polo is a variant of polo played whilst riding elephants. It is played in Nepal, Sri Lanka, Rajasthan (India), and Thailan. Equipment consists of a standard polo ball and six to nine foot cane (similar to bamboo) sticks with a polo mallet head on the end.

The pitch is three-quarters of the length of a standard polo pitch, due to the slower speed of the elephants. Two people ride each elephant; the elephants are steered by mahouts, while the player tells the mahout which way to go and hits the ball.

Although elephant polo was first played in India at the beginning of the twentieth century, the modern game originated in Meghauly, Nepal, reportedly after a drinking bout Tiger Tops in Nepal remains the headquarters of elephant polo and the site of the World Elephant Polo Championships. As of December 2008, the world elephant polo champions were England.
Elephant Polo in Nepal and Thailand is played under the auspices of the World Elephant Polo Association. WEPA enforces strict rules regarding elephant welfare and game play.

As of December 2007, Chopard, Hong Kong is the reigning champion of the World Elephant Polo Association. Other tournaments, such as those played in India and Sri Lanka, are managed independently of each other and the World Elephant Polo Association.

Paragliding sport

Paragliding is a recreational and competitive flying sport. A paraglider is a free-flying, foot-launched aircraft. The pilot sits in a harness suspended below a fabric wing, whose shape is formed by its suspension lines and the pressure of air entering vents in the front of the wing.
In 1952 Domina Jalbert advance governable parachutes with multi-cells and controls for controlling lateral glide of the device.
In 1954, Walter Neumark predicted (in an article in Flight magazine) a time when a glider pilot would be “able to launch himself by running over the edge of a cliff or down a slope ... whether on a rock-climbing holiday in Skye or ski-ing in the Alps”. In 1961, the French engineer Pierre Lemoigne produced improved parachute designs which led to the Para-Commander (‘PC’), which had cut-outs at the rear and sides that enabled it to be towed into the air and steered – leading to parasailing/parascending.
Sometimes credited with the greatest development in parachutes since Leonardo da Vinci, the American Domina Jalbert invented his filed-for January 10, 1963 US Patent 3131894 the Parafoil which had sectioned cells in an aerofoil shape; an open leading edge and a closed trailing edge, inflated by passage through the air – the ram-air design. Meanwhile, David Barish was developing the Sail Wing for recovery of NASA space capsules – “slope soaring was a way of testing out ... the Sail Wing”. After tests on Hunter Mountain, New York in September 1965, he went on to promote ‘slope soaring’ as a summer activity for ski resorts (apparently without great success).NASA originated the term ‘paraglider’ in the early 1960’s, and ‘paragliding’ was first used in the early 1970’s to describe foot-launching of gliding parachutes.
Author Walter Neumark wrote Operating Procedures for Ascending Parachutes, and he and a group of enthusiasts with a passion for tow-launching ‘PCs’ and ram-air parachutes eventually broke away from the British Parachute Association to form the British Association of Parascending Clubs (BAPC) in 1973. Authors Patrick Gilligan (Canada) and Betrand Dubuis (Switzerland) wrote the first flight manual "The Paragliding Manual" in 1985, officially coining the word Paragliding.
These threads were pulled together in June 1978 by three friends Jean-Claude Bétemps, André Bohn and Gérard Bosson from Mieussy Haute-Savoie, France. After inspiration from an article on ‘slope soaring’ in the Parachute Manual magazine by parachutist & publisher Dan Poynter, they calculated that on a suitable slope, a ‘square’ ram-air parachute could be inflated by running down the slope; Bétemps launched from Pointe du Pertuiset, Mieussy, and flew 100 m. Bohn followed him and glided down to the football pitch in the valley 1000 metres below. ‘Parapente’ (pente being French for slope) was born.
Through the 1980’s and since, it has been a story of constantly improving equipment and ever greater numbers of paragliding pilots. The first World Championship was held in Kössen, Austria in 1989.

motard sports

Motard is the French word for Biker.
Supermoto, or Supermotard is a cross-over or evolution of motocross and road racing. Races are commonly held on road racing or medium sized go-kart tracks with an off-road section in the infield. Most supermoto race tracks are typically configured with approximately 70% tarmac and 30% dirt with small jumps but a dirt section is not required. The motorcycles used are frequently custom-created combinations of off-road motorcycles and road-racing rims/tires, known as 'supermotard' bikes. Riders also wear a combination of road race and offroad equipment, normally leathers and a motocross helmet and boots. Unlike normal motorcycle racing, the emphasis lies on slower (<100 mph / <161 km/h), short and twisty tracks, where rider skill matters far more than outright machine performance.
History
Supermoto has its origins in the 1970s where ABC’s Wide World of Sports was the highest-rated sports show in the United States. In 1979, ABC commissioned a made-for-TV event to be included in the series, named Superbikers, whose intention was to find the ultimate all-around motorcycle racer. Superbikers was then manifested as a yearly event run at southern California's Carlsbad Raceway. The show's tarmac-and-dirt courses were intended to draw on talent from the worlds of off-road, flat-track and road-racing. World and National Championship-winning motorcycling greats such as Kenny Roberts and Jeff Ward, whose respective sports at the time were road-racing and motocross, participated in the races. The Superbikers quickly became a huge Nielsen rating contender, running until 1985, at which point ABC was forced to cancel the show due to new management and cuts; its cancellation also initiated a long sabbatical of the sport in the USA. The European racers who participated in the sport at Carlsbad, however, brought it back to Europe with them, where it quickly gained popularity in countries such as France.
2003 signalled the resurrection of the sport in the United States with the birth of the AMA Supermoto championship and with the ESPN X-Games Supermoto championship.
Machines
Prior to the 1990s, supermoto bikes, including the precursor motorcycles used in Superbikers, were converted open-class two-stroke motocross or enduro bikes desired for their lightweight and jumping abilities. The motorcycles currently used for Supermoto racing are predominantly single-cylinder 4 stroke powered dirtbikes with 17" or 16.5" wheels. The 17" rims allow the use of up to 5.5" wide superbike road racing slicks. Slick tires are often hand grooved on the rear tire to facilitate slightly better acceleration on the dirt stretches of a supermoto course. Suspension is lowered and slightly stiffened in comparison with a stock dirt bike, and braking power is improved with oversize front brake rotors and calipers. Despite the lack of trees on supermoto courses, 'bark busters' (hand guards) are frequently added to supermoto bikes due the extreme cornering angles achieved by riders. Hand guards also greatly improve survivability of the brake & clutch levers during a fall making supermoto bikes highly crash resistant and often able to quickly re-enter the fray during a race following a crash.

F1 powerboar sports

F1 Powerboat World Championship is a competition of power yachts with rules similar to Formula 1 car racing. Each F1 powerboat race lasts approximately 45 minutes following a circuit marked out in a selected stretch of water, usually a lake, river, or sheltered bay.
Qualifying periods decide the formation of the grid, and timing equipment records the performance of competitors to decide the final classification and allocation of championship points. The sport is governed by the Monaco based Union Internationale Motonautique (UIM, International Power Boating Association).
Format
Inaugurated in 1981, F1 powerboat racing is a Grand Prix style event, similar to Formula One automobile racing, in which teams compete in 13 venues around the world each season. In the 2006 season, 27 drivers competed for 12 teams, with 24 boats competing in any one race. The races take place along a track of approximately 350 meters with multiple turns, over which the boats can reach 240 kilometers per hour (150 mph). The races are longer than most powerboat races at approximately 45 minutes, but still shorter than most automobile races.
Boats
F1 racing uses tunnel hull catamarans that are capable of both high speed and exceptional maneuverability. Overall, the boats weigh 860 pounds (390 kilogrammes), including 260 pounds (118 kilogrammes) of engine. They are 20 feet (6 metres) long and seven feet (2 metres) wide, keeping weight low through extensive use of carbon fiber and kevlar. The tunnel hull design creates an air cushion under the hull, so that at speed only a few inches touch the water, leading to the high speed possible with these hulls.
F1 boats are powered by a Mercury Marine V6 two stroke that burns 100LL Avgas at a rate of 120 liters (32 gallons) per hour, generating 350 horsepower at 10,500 rpm. This engine can propel the boats to 100 km/h (62 mph) in less than four seconds and to a maximum speed of over 240 km/h (150 mph).
Safety
Although F1 boats have not changed much in appearance since the start of the event, the construction and safety has been dramatically improved from the original open-cockpit plywood boats.
The first major development was the hard composite cockpit capsule designed to break away from the rest of the boat in a crash. This also inaugurated the practice of securing the drivers to their seats with a harness. First developed by designer and racer Chris Hodges, this system was optional for a time due to the opposition of the drivers but, after it saved several drivers in major crashes, the UIM mandated it for all boats. In the early 1990s F1 boat builder Dave Burgess introduced a canopy that fully enclosed the cockpit to protect the driver from the full force of water in a nose-dive. In the late 1990s boat builder DAC introduced an airbag situated behind the driver that prevents the cockpit from completely submerging if the boat flips.
These specific changes in safety features were also accompanied by a progression of lighter and stronger composite hulls that also reduced the hazards of racing. F1 drivers now also wear a HANS Head and Neck Restraint device similar to that worn by their Formula One automobile racing counterparts to combat head and neck injuries.As of the 2007 season, all boats are required to have a crash box installed. Potential future safety features include collapsible bows that would deform rather than penetrate another hull.

fighter kites

Fighter kites are kites that are used for the sport of kite fighting. Countries where kite fighting is particularly well-known include Afghanistan, India, Pakistan, Korea, and Guyana.[citation needed]
Most fighter kites are small unstable single line flat kites. Tension in the line will cause the kite to deform into a shape that allows the kite to track in a straight path, so to control the kite, the flier will release line until the nose of the kite is pointed in the direction that the flier wants the kite to go, and then they will pull in line to make the kite track.
Traditionally most fighter kites are flown with an abrasive line with the aim of cutting the line of opponents kites, but in some forms of competition kites are flown to capture and bring down the opponents kite - or to just touch the opponents flying line.
Materials used to make fighter kites
In most traditional fighter kite manufacture, the skins of kites are made from a lightweight thin paper and the spars are usually made from a lightweight and flexible wood, usually bamboo.
In modern American fighters, the kite skins are made from a variety of synthetic materials - mylar, aircraft insulation (orcon or insulfab), nylon, and polyester sheeting. The spine is often bamboo but the bow, and often also the spine, is usually fiberglass or carbon fiber.
Line used for fighter kites
Historically, for most Asian type fighters, a thin cotton or hemp line is coated with a mixture of finely crushed glass and rice glue. In recent years, synthetic line has been coated with a variety of abrasives and stronger glue, also, there have been some reports of metallic line being used. Some cultures use line that has metal knives attached to hook and cut the opponents line.
In line touch competition, synthetic braided fishing line, 15 to 20 lb test, is used due to its low stretch and high strength for the line diameter and weight. Waxed cotton or linen line is also used.

Hare coursing

Hare coursing is the pursuit of hares with Greyhounds and other sighthounds, which chase the hare by sight and not by scent. It is a competitive sport, in which dogs are tested on their ability to run, overtake and turn a hare, rather than a form of hunting aiming at the capture of game. It has a number of variations in its rules around the world. Informal coursing can be a true form of hunting. It is often conducted to kill game or vermin, mainly for food, and occasionally as a form of gambling.
Coursing is a long established and almost universal hunting technique, practiced historically with Greyhounds, other sighthound breeds, or with lurchers which are cross bred sighthounds, and working breeds. The sport grew in popularity in the UK and Europe during the 19th century, but has since experienced a decline due in part to the introduction of Greyhound racing and betting.
In recent decades some controversy has developed around hare coursing in the UK and USA, with some viewing it as a cruel bloodsport and others seeing it as a traditional activity that assists in the conservation of hares and tests the ability of sighthounds. Since 2002, hare coursing has been banned in Great Britain but continues elsewhere in the world as a regulated and judged, competitive sport, especially in the Republic of Ireland and Spain, as well as in Russia and the Western United States. Elsewhere, in Eurasia for example, coursing continues as a classic form of hunting.
Whether for sporting or hunting purposes, hare coursing was in the UK and Europe historically restricted to landowners and the nobility, who used sighthounds, the ownership of which was at certain historic times prohibited among the lower social classes The oldest documented description of hare coursing is the work Kynegetikos (Greek), otherwise known as Cynegeticus (Latin), which was written by Arrian circa 180 AD. This work, known from its first complete English translation as On Coursing 1831, by William Dansey, was considered by its original author as a necessary addition to the classic work of the same name Cynegeticus (On Hunting), scent hunting, by Xenophon. Arrian felt compelled to describe the sight hunt and sighthounds because the Ancient Greeks only knew the scent hunt. It is from Arrian that the most famous quote on the sporting fairness of coursing originates "... true huntsmen do not take out their hounds to catch the creature, but for a trial of speed and a race, and they are satisfied if the hare manages to find something that will rescue her".
The competitive version of hare coursing was given definitive form in the UK when the first complete set of English rules was drawn up in the reign of Elizabeth I by Thomas Duke of Norfolk, providing for a pursuit of no more than two hounds, a headstart termed "Law" to be given to the hare for a fair run, and for the manner of awarding points on "Speed", "Go-bye", "Turn", "Wrench", "Kill" & "Trip", to judge the dogs' performance. The first modern coursing club was established at Swaffham in 1776, and the National Coursing Club was founded to regulate the sport in 1858.During the 1800s, coursing crossed the class divide, and reached its peak of popularity, with more than 150 coursing clubs in Britain, some attracting up to 80,000 people.By the late 19th century, hare coursing had become a predominantly working class sport.
Coursing declined during the 20th century, notably due to the development of urban Greyhound racing in the 1920s, and there were less than 30 coursing clubs in the UK by 2000.