Let the Games Begin...Badminton Traditional Cache
MATKB: They have clear cut all vegetation at GZ to make the bike path more accessible. So cache container and hiding spot are now gone. This one is gone permanently.
Let the Games Begin...Badminton
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Size: 
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The Summer Olympics begin on July 27, 2012, in London, England. In their honor, we have created a series of caches to highlight the Olympic sporting disciplines. We will release a new cache as the first medal is awarded in each discipline. In each cache, you will see a code for the Closing Ceremony cache. The first 26 cachers who log all 26 sporting, Opening, and Closing Ceremony caches will win a special Olympic prize.
It is widely accepted that badminton was derived from an English sport called battledore and shuttlecock. British military officers stationed in India during the middle of the 18th century adapted battledore and shuttlecock to play with a net. This new game was quite popular at the military base in a town called Poona, so it was called Poona for a while. When the officers returned to England, the game came with them and they further developed the rules of play. No one is sure why or when the name changed to Badminton, however it is not disputed that the name is derived from the Duke of Beaufort's home in Gloucestershire, Badminton House.
Badminton became an Olympic sport in 1992. There will be five medal events for the Games: Men's Singles, Women's Singles, Men's Doubles, Women's Doubles, and Mixed Doubles. There are 172 registered athletes this year (86 men and 86 women). Countries may send 3 athletes for each Singles event and two pairs for each Doubles event. Qualification was done by a world ranking list. All Olympic athletes will play in a preliminary round. There will be 16 Singles group winners and 8 Doubles group winners, who move on to a knock-out round for the medals.
The Singles court is slightly smaller than the Doubles court. The goal is to hit the shuttlecock (shuttle, bird, or birdie) over the net so your opponent cannot return it within the court boundary. Most of us are familiar with plastic shuttlecocks, however competitive shuttlecocks have 16 feathers from a goose's left wing (apparently right wing feathers have more curvature and the feathers used must be uniform in size and shape). The feather shuttlecocks are more prone to breakage, therefore the public market created plastic versions. Competitive players can get the shuttlecock to travel at 400 km/h our more!
Matches are best of three games. Players must score 21 points and have a margin of 2 points to win the game. Should a game reach a score of 29-29, the next player to score a point wins the game. There is a one minute break when the first player scores 11 points. In the third game, after the first athlete scores 11 points, the players rotate ends of the court. Players continue to serve as long as they score a point. When their competitor scores, service is transferred to them. Service is rotated from left (when the score is even) to right (when the score is odd). For Doubles matches, the service does not rotate between serves. It will stay with one player until service is transferred to the other team. When the other team loses serve, the serve transfers back to the partner who did not serve last. Unlike the serving side, players receiving the serve do not have to alternate sides during play.
The container for this cache is a glitter tube carefully placed. DO NOT PULL THE TUBE OUT!!! Remove the cap and log only. You may need tweezers to remove the log. Please bring your own writing utensil.
FTF- BoxmanCrew (who rushed over after medaling at another sporting event )...Congrats on FTF!!!
STF- Congrats on the silver johngie!!
TTF- gvsu4msu takes home the bronze!
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Pnhtug va gur sbyvntr....