Watch The Birdie: Badminton Is Not Just For The Back Yard

I've never thought of badminton as a game you finish, wipe the sweat off your mouth and announce that it's time for beer. Badminton was the game we played, beers in hand, on suburban lawns.

And I've never trusted any sport in which players wear too much white. I thought a real game entailed dirt, mud and sweat and risked more than just grass stains.

But I was wrong. And I was fascinated by how wrong I truly was. A few nights ago I entered the doors of Seattle's Northwest Center, walked into a gym painted entirely in Howard-Johnson-aqua, and watched the Athletes at work.

Badminton is a violent sport, a sport of finesse and deception, sweat and chipped teeth and objects flying through the air (at least briefly) sometimes at 200 miles per hour. Badminton requires strategy, fakeouts and plenty of fluids. A singles player runs the equivalent of a mile in the course of a 15-point match.

All in pursuit of a little leather-covered cork adorned with 16 feathers from the left wing of a white goose.

An Olympic sport since 1992, badminton attracts crowds of up to 15,000 in Malaysia. And in Seattle, over the next few weeks, it'll attract local throngs, with the state and national championships. Badminton is not just for barbecues any longer. In a city where rain reigns supreme, an indoor game like this can help you stay sane and svelte year-round.

Seattle is one of the few cities in the country where you can play a lot during the week, said Gene Kumekawa, secretary of the Washington State Badminton Association. He has been playing indoors since 1972 and was the resident guru the night I visited. If you're willing to travel from North Seattle to Renton, you can play seven nights a week during the season (fall through spring).

Kumekawa likes the game because of its technical complexity and the way players can direct the shuttlecock in three or four different directions with a simple shot, so that opponents can't predict how to follow the birdie.

The doubles players we watched were amazing, and included Ufilya Davis, the current women's national singles champion in the 35-to-40 age group. Waiting for a serve, she and her partner struck a pose worthy of statuary, with their rackets high and their bodies poised and concentrated, as if in the middle of a tai chi routine. As soon as the bird was launched the players performed a series of amazing saves. Each shot seemed to land just out of reach but they zinged them back, right to where their opponents weren't. I could see why this was pitched as the fastest racquet sport on Earth.

"In tennis you sometimes do a passing shot, where you hit the ball on the run and give up on the next shot. In badminton you always have a chance," Kumekawa said.

After one pair missed a point that the forward player might have been able to nail, I asked him if there were lots of fights between doubles players.

"Only if they're married to each other," he said, laughing. He remarked on how few of the highly ranked pairs he knew were pairs off the court.

We watched the "A" players, the seriously good ones. Many of the state's badminton pooh-bahs came out of a junior program that ran in Port Angeles in the 1970s, and never quit, Kumekawa said. This weekend the WSBA will conduct the statewide open tourney. And more than 100 players are expected at the national seniors tournament at the Renton Community Center on April 15 to 18. Admission to both events is free.

Yes, badminton is a spectator sport. See if you can tell the differences between a smash, a drop shot (an overhead shot that lands just in front of net), a net shot (a trajectory shaped like a hairpin, taking off and landing near the net), or a clear (moving from baseline to baseline).

By the end of the evening, the wooden floors of the four courts were dusted with goose feathers - some players go through two or more birdies a game. And one player said to the other - I swear it - "Wanna grab a cold one at T.S. McHugh's?"

Tina Kelley's column runs Fridays in Northwest Weekend. She can be reached at Northwest Weekend, The Seattle Times, P.O. Box 70, Seattle, WA 98111 or via e-mail at weekend@seatimes.com. ------------------------------- If you go

The Northwest Center, 1550 W. Armory Way, Seattle, is open Wednesday nights for tournament players, from 7:30 to 11 p.m.; Thursdays nights in the summer from 7:30 to 11 p.m.; and Sundays from noon to 3 p.m. for beginners, and 3 to 6 p.m. for advanced tournament players. Admission is $4.

Highline High School, at 225 S. 152nd in Burien, offers courts from 7 to 10 p.m. on Mondays and Thursdays.

For online information check out http://www.fortunebiz.com/ElliottBayBadminton. Note that the Web address is case sensitive, so those capital letters must be capitalized.