Erik Meijs of The Netherlands has been training at the Badminton Europe Certificated Training Centre (CTC) in Greve, Denmark for more than a week now. Thanks to his current spot on the world rankings (180), he was able to apply for a scholarship to train there for three weeks. He shares with us his experience after his first week.

“Last Monday, June 4, 2012 my visit to Denmark started with a long trip by car. Late in the evening I finally reached Copenhagen. I am staying there in an apartment. Of course I went to bed as soon as possible, because next morning training started already at 8.00 o'clock sharp. 

I had been in Greve already last year for a very short period. Some of the players I knew from those training sessions and it was nice to meet with them again. Other players were new.  

On that particular morning, on Tuesday, we started with a little warming up to be ready for the training session of Nadia Lyduch. But, I had a very unlucky start, because after not more than 10 minutes I went through my ankle. It didn’t feel good and I had to stop for a few minutes. I couldn’t move normal anymore, so Nadia Lyduch decided that I only could work from stand still and feed the other players or work on my own technical focus points.

Of course I really felt bad about this, but there is nothing you can do about it, you just have to accept it and try to work as hard as possible and to treat the ankle in a way that the injury will disappear as soon as possible. I had also contact with my physiotherapist in the Netherlands and together we decided that it was not a problem to stay in Greve. 

Before I went to Greve I had sent my focus points to Nadia Lyduch. Of course it is really bad if you cannot practise 100%, but in my case it’s not really so bad that I am not able at the moment to use the full court and to focus and concentrate even more on my techniques. I am lucky that Nadia is the trainer in Greve, because she has been able to work out a programme for me which is still very useful.

The rest of the week I worked every day on my specific focus points. In spite of the fact that I could not move over the entire field, there still were very heavy training sessions because I had to focus and concentrate for two hours on specific strokes and very specific details about using the racket and the shuttle. 

Apart from the regular training sessions we did also some warming up sessions all together. The warming up sessions differ a bit from what I do at home, but it worked out really well! First, you think it has nothing to do with badminton at all, but when you’re doing the exercises of Nadia you feel it’s really good for your focus, concentration, footwork and so on.

Of course during those days I also got individual practise from Nadia. It was really good for me, because when she sees something which is wrong she immediately stops feeding and explains what went wrong. She is able to see every little details and has a lot of specific expertise. 

If you make progress everyone will hear it in the hall. In that way the player gets a lot of motivation to make even further progress. Everybody is helping each other to do it right, which is very efficient. 

By the end of the week there was also progress on my injury and I could move already a little bit more on the court. 

I really hope the second week my ankle will heal more to be able to work also on my other focus points. Let’s see and hope!”

For more information on the Badminton Europe CTC and Scholarships, click here.

Photo by BadmintonPhoto