You know that feeling when you play an amazing shot and even your opponents look at you like
that was unbelievable?! Well in THIS video we're going to teach you one of these shots
It's possibly one of the coolest and most satisfying shots you can play in defence!
So we asked a few of the people you've just seen what they call this shot and they didn't seem to
have a name for it but we know it as the brap which is what former English player Andy Ellis
came up with so that's what we're calling it in this video and maybe it can be a word you
add to your badminton dictionary too! Now before we teach you how to play the brap we need to briefly
tell you when you should play it as there are definitely a few WRONG times where you don't want to attempt this shot!
So you play the brap when the shuttle comes to your forehand side and around the
height of your racket arm shoulder and this means you can play the shot from either a flatter shot
like a drive or a flat smash or if you're really low in your defensive position like this...
This is really important as it's almost impossible to play this shot effectively
if you're taking it lower than the height of your shoulder! So the brap is best used when your
opponents aren't quite on balance but they still hit a hard shot however this can also be used when
you're under pressure in defence - you just need a very strong risk and good timing to do this!
So that covers when you should play this shot but how do you actually do it?
Firstly and probably most importantly you need to be in a backhand grip
and this is for two reasons; number one is that you
need to use your thumb to help you generate power on the shot and number two is that if you try to
play this shot in a forehand grip then you'd be too tucked in making it much harder to play
the shot with power and accuracy! So as soon as you see the shuttle coming to your forehand side wider
than your shoulder and at around shoulder height you want to bring your hand up so that it's roughly in
line with your nose and your elbow down. Staying in a backhand grip your elbow then moves towards your
body and you turn your wrist in this motion so the back of the hand finishes up facing the net!
If you struggle with this then try moving your wrist in a similar way like this without holding your racket!
Now that's just what you do with your arm but it's also really important to get your
footwork right when playing this shot! You need to be straightening your racket leg as you hit the
shot with your non-racket leg remaining bent - this helps you to create power and also enables you to
turn your body and be able to play it cross-court! And in case you haven't already worked out you'd
mainly play this shot cross-court if you're stood on the right side if you're right-handed
and left side if you're left-handed and this is because your natural swing and the technique
we've just described is to go cross but it is possible to hit it straight if you're stood on
the left side if you're right-handed and the right side if you're left-handed but typically there's
less space to hit into on the straight so it's less likely to be a winning shot and the brap
requires a bigger swing so you'll need to have a fast racket swing to recover for the next shot!
And finally remember to make sure you're leaning forwards as you hit it and you're not leaning
backwards as this will make it harder to time and reduce the chance of success! So by this
point hopefully you've realised just how cool this shot is but how do you practice it so that you can
actually do it in a game? Well we have four great progressions for you! Level one is to get someone
to hit one shuttle at a time to the hitting zone and you can just practice playing this shot
with the correct technique and if you don't have someone that can feed like this then you can get
them to throw the shuttle in and it's important to focus on the technique more than the power to
begin with, the power will come with practice over time! Level two you can do on your own here you're
going to do wall hitting where you hit alternately between the backhand and the brap this gets you
used to going from hitting a shot on the backhand side to hitting a brap and it'll also force you to
create a bit more power in your shot. If you can do this you can definitely do it in a match!!
Yes you can because it's a lot easier when you're able to use the pace from your opponent's shot and this
is what we're going to be doing in level 3 where you lift your partner they play a flat-ish smash
and you play a brap. This is going to help you get used to the timing when the shuttle is coming from
the back of the court! And of course practice from both positions that you can play it from :D
And finally level four is to play in a match but don't try and force it into every rally
you might only play it once or twice throughout a whole match but when you do pull it off
you, your partner and your opponents are going to think you're amazing!
So that's a brap! Let us know if you're going to try it out by leaving a fire emoji in the
comments below and have fun with it :D And lastly if you've enjoyed this video please give it a like,
SMASH the subscribe button if you haven't already and we'll see you on another video :-)