SAN FRANCISCO: Singapore rose passionately behind the highs and lows of its badminton players at the Paris Olympics, revelling in Loh Kean Yew becoming the first Singaporean singles player to reach the Olympic quarter-finals in two decades, to profoundly experiencing the anguish of Yeo Jia Min’s exit from the round of 16.
This energy hearkens to the national football team’s heyday competing in the Malaysia Cup. “Football’s coming home” is a well-loved slogan in English football, suggesting not only were the English among the first official rule-makers in the sport, but how the fervour of English football fans is in a league of their own.
Perhaps unbeknown to many, the Singapore Badminton Association, officially established in 1929, predates the Badminton World Federation’s 1934 founding in England. This made Singapore one of the first official badminton governing bodies in the world though Singapore was still part of British Malaya.
Moreover, the world’s most dominant and decorated badminton player in the 1930s to 1950s was none other than Singapore’s Wong Peng Soon.
Yet, a cry of “badminton’s coming home” for Singapore will carry a different but perhaps more poignant meaning today. The current crop of badminton Olympians grew up in the 2000s, during the era of the Foreign Sports Talent Scheme which focused on recruiting sports talent abroad.
In the 1990s, I was a girl who knew little about badminton but was familiar with the household name of Zarinah Abdullah.
Zarinah Abdullah was Singapore’s first female badminton Olympian in 1992 when the sport made its Olympic debut. Ranked as high as world number three in women’s singles, her 1993 SEA Games bronze medal won on home soil sparked a mini-revival of “badminton coming home”, continuing from Wong Shoon Keat’s 1983 SEA Games gold medal.
When I picked up the sport in 1997, it was a surprise to see the Singapore Badminton Association implement the Foreign Sports Talent Scheme shortly after.
Even though I was nowhere near playing competitive badminton at the Olympic level, I met many peers at national inter-school or inter-club badminton events whom I thought would have a good shot to compete at the Olympic Games.
Several of my peers did decide to give professional badminton a shot, but were tasked chiefly as sparring partners in the national team, which would have been discouraging for aspiring national players.
Singapore Badminton Association has since pivoted away from the Foreign Sports Talent Scheme towards youth development, which has been a welcome move by the local badminton fraternity. New leadership and the recent hiring of former Malaysian national badminton player and youth development specialist, Joanne Quay, as the Director of Junior Performance Programme, are steps in the right direction.
When I worked for the Badminton World Federation at the London 2012 Olympic Games, I got to meet badminton players from around the world who are well-educated and held “day jobs”. A difference that separated the reigning great badminton nations from the rest of the world is their systematic and holistic athlete development from school-going age.
Until the Singapore Sports School was established in 2004, there was no real imagination for a young Singaporean badminton player even with the best of talent to reach the Olympics.
The emergence of the Paris 2024 Olympic badminton quartet (Loh Kean Yew, Terry Hee, Jessica Tan and Yeo Jia Min), who are all alumni of the Singapore Sports School, was made possible by the unique, all-rounded training they received during their critical teenage years.
For the Singapore Sports School, now in its 20th year, badminton is a success story in restoring an Olympic pathway for students.
Being a highly technical sport that blends art and science, the historical success of former Singapore greats arguably lies in perfecting the art of badminton.
However, badminton has experienced a renaissance over the past two decades. With scoring system changes and the world governing body’s efforts to globalise the sport, badminton has evolved greatly in its variety and intensity. Sports science is needed more than ever to decode new tactics, minimise injuries and maximise longevity.
This is the area where Singapore’s scientific prowess has likely provided a winning edge for our national badminton players who came through the Singapore Sports School pipeline.
Born between 1993 and 1999, the Olympic badminton quartet was part of the early days of the Singapore Sports School experiment. Their teenage years spent studying, competing and living at the top facility in Woodlands were also overseen by world-class local and foreign sports scientists.
The comprehensive sporting talent pool of the Singapore Sports School work together to look after a young student-athlete’s nutrition via their diets, fitness via strength and conditioning, their techniques or tactics via sports biomechanics, their mental health via sports psychology, and their recovery via physiotherapy.
When athletes graduate to the senior badminton stage at 18 years old, they are operationally ready to go pro.
Two-time men’s singles Olympic champion, Viktor Axelsen of Denmark, is an example of a new-age badminton superstar who has nailed both the art and science of the sport. Denmark has long proven that a nation’s population size does not matter in the pursuit of Olympic medals.
If the Singapore Sports School had set our athletes up for a long career, there could still be another Olympic Games under the belt for Yeo Jia Min and Loh Kean Yew, who will be 29 and 31 respectively at Los Angeles 2028.
Denmark's Viktor Axelsen celebrates after defeating Singapore's Loh Kean Yew during their men's singles badminton quarter final match at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Friday, Aug 2, 2024, in Paris, France. (AP Photo/Dita Alangkara)
While there is still a lot of work they would need to put into their games to close the gap and achieve consistency with those on the podium - who are likely to also feature at Los Angeles 2028 - Yeo and Loh’s work are also done in the poignant sense of “bringing badminton home”.
Together with Terry Hee and Jessica Tan in Paris 2024, they convey the message that if they can compete at the world’s biggest stage, so too can Singaporean children who aspire to be like them. That is what representation does: It incubates deep, real dreams.
These days, my phone is buzzing from parent-friends in Singapore whose kids are asking to play badminton, which my friends have no clue about and need some advice in.
To these parents, I say, let your kids play. To our badminton Olympians, this may already be your legacy. And may you all play on, bravely.
Jan Lin Lee is a filmmaker currently based in California and a former school badminton player in Singapore. She worked on the professional badminton circuit and for the Olympics.
Continue reading...
This energy hearkens to the national football team’s heyday competing in the Malaysia Cup. “Football’s coming home” is a well-loved slogan in English football, suggesting not only were the English among the first official rule-makers in the sport, but how the fervour of English football fans is in a league of their own.
Perhaps unbeknown to many, the Singapore Badminton Association, officially established in 1929, predates the Badminton World Federation’s 1934 founding in England. This made Singapore one of the first official badminton governing bodies in the world though Singapore was still part of British Malaya.
Moreover, the world’s most dominant and decorated badminton player in the 1930s to 1950s was none other than Singapore’s Wong Peng Soon.
Yet, a cry of “badminton’s coming home” for Singapore will carry a different but perhaps more poignant meaning today. The current crop of badminton Olympians grew up in the 2000s, during the era of the Foreign Sports Talent Scheme which focused on recruiting sports talent abroad.
FROM ZARINAH ABDULLAH TO YEO JIAMIN
In the 1990s, I was a girl who knew little about badminton but was familiar with the household name of Zarinah Abdullah.
Zarinah Abdullah was Singapore’s first female badminton Olympian in 1992 when the sport made its Olympic debut. Ranked as high as world number three in women’s singles, her 1993 SEA Games bronze medal won on home soil sparked a mini-revival of “badminton coming home”, continuing from Wong Shoon Keat’s 1983 SEA Games gold medal.
When I picked up the sport in 1997, it was a surprise to see the Singapore Badminton Association implement the Foreign Sports Talent Scheme shortly after.
Even though I was nowhere near playing competitive badminton at the Olympic level, I met many peers at national inter-school or inter-club badminton events whom I thought would have a good shot to compete at the Olympic Games.
Several of my peers did decide to give professional badminton a shot, but were tasked chiefly as sparring partners in the national team, which would have been discouraging for aspiring national players.
Singapore Badminton Association has since pivoted away from the Foreign Sports Talent Scheme towards youth development, which has been a welcome move by the local badminton fraternity. New leadership and the recent hiring of former Malaysian national badminton player and youth development specialist, Joanne Quay, as the Director of Junior Performance Programme, are steps in the right direction.
Related:
When I worked for the Badminton World Federation at the London 2012 Olympic Games, I got to meet badminton players from around the world who are well-educated and held “day jobs”. A difference that separated the reigning great badminton nations from the rest of the world is their systematic and holistic athlete development from school-going age.
Until the Singapore Sports School was established in 2004, there was no real imagination for a young Singaporean badminton player even with the best of talent to reach the Olympics.
The emergence of the Paris 2024 Olympic badminton quartet (Loh Kean Yew, Terry Hee, Jessica Tan and Yeo Jia Min), who are all alumni of the Singapore Sports School, was made possible by the unique, all-rounded training they received during their critical teenage years.
THE ART AND SCIENCE OF BADMINTON
For the Singapore Sports School, now in its 20th year, badminton is a success story in restoring an Olympic pathway for students.
Being a highly technical sport that blends art and science, the historical success of former Singapore greats arguably lies in perfecting the art of badminton.
However, badminton has experienced a renaissance over the past two decades. With scoring system changes and the world governing body’s efforts to globalise the sport, badminton has evolved greatly in its variety and intensity. Sports science is needed more than ever to decode new tactics, minimise injuries and maximise longevity.
This is the area where Singapore’s scientific prowess has likely provided a winning edge for our national badminton players who came through the Singapore Sports School pipeline.
Related:
Born between 1993 and 1999, the Olympic badminton quartet was part of the early days of the Singapore Sports School experiment. Their teenage years spent studying, competing and living at the top facility in Woodlands were also overseen by world-class local and foreign sports scientists.
The comprehensive sporting talent pool of the Singapore Sports School work together to look after a young student-athlete’s nutrition via their diets, fitness via strength and conditioning, their techniques or tactics via sports biomechanics, their mental health via sports psychology, and their recovery via physiotherapy.
When athletes graduate to the senior badminton stage at 18 years old, they are operationally ready to go pro.
WHEN REPRESENTATION MATTERS IN SPORTS
Two-time men’s singles Olympic champion, Viktor Axelsen of Denmark, is an example of a new-age badminton superstar who has nailed both the art and science of the sport. Denmark has long proven that a nation’s population size does not matter in the pursuit of Olympic medals.
If the Singapore Sports School had set our athletes up for a long career, there could still be another Olympic Games under the belt for Yeo Jia Min and Loh Kean Yew, who will be 29 and 31 respectively at Los Angeles 2028.
Denmark's Viktor Axelsen celebrates after defeating Singapore's Loh Kean Yew during their men's singles badminton quarter final match at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Friday, Aug 2, 2024, in Paris, France. (AP Photo/Dita Alangkara)
While there is still a lot of work they would need to put into their games to close the gap and achieve consistency with those on the podium - who are likely to also feature at Los Angeles 2028 - Yeo and Loh’s work are also done in the poignant sense of “bringing badminton home”.
Together with Terry Hee and Jessica Tan in Paris 2024, they convey the message that if they can compete at the world’s biggest stage, so too can Singaporean children who aspire to be like them. That is what representation does: It incubates deep, real dreams.
These days, my phone is buzzing from parent-friends in Singapore whose kids are asking to play badminton, which my friends have no clue about and need some advice in.
To these parents, I say, let your kids play. To our badminton Olympians, this may already be your legacy. And may you all play on, bravely.
Jan Lin Lee is a filmmaker currently based in California and a former school badminton player in Singapore. She worked on the professional badminton circuit and for the Olympics.
Related:
Continue reading...