HIGH-TECH HELPED BEAT INDONESIANS IN SINGLES

August 17, 1996 (D.Shuttlenws) - Indonesia, one of the world's top
badminton nations, came away from the badminton singles competition at
the recently concluded Atlanta Olympic Games without the gold medals
that they so dearly value.

The best showing in the singles that they could muster was a a silver in
the women's singles from 16-year old Mia Audina. 1992 Olympic gold
medalist Susi Susanti had to be content with a bronze.

The Indonesian men fared worse and went home without a medal in the
singles. In Barcelona in 1992, they won gold, silver and bronze medals.

The Indonesian association, their coaches, players and supporters are
now contemplating on why they fared below their high standard and
expectations.

Reports from Jakarta focus the blame on the team management and
specifically on the team general manager, Lutfi Hamid.

Sources close to the Danish and Korean gold medalists point to
another reason the Indonesian singles players came away without the
gold: HIGH-TECH.

Men's singles gold medalist Poul-Erik Hoyer-Larsen and women's singles
gold medalist Bang Soo Hyun, together with their coaches, studied
videotapes of their Indonesian rivals very intensively. Using advanced
slow-motion and stop-motion features, they noted tendencies and slight
preparatory movements that gave them clues as to what shot was going to be
played and where.

From this analysis, the coaches and players devised drills and tactics
to help them prepare for their matches against the top Indonesians.

The use of the videos for analysis by the Danes have been going on for
some time. After winning the prestigious All-England for the first time
in 1994, Hoyer-Larsen attributed some of his win to the video analysis
and tactical preparation that Morten Frost and he had done to prepare
for a potential finals match against the Indonesian Heryanto Arbi.

A prominent Korean coach advises though that video analysis was not
enough to beat the Indonesians. The right player had to have the
physical and mental tools to use the video analysis to good advantage.
Hoyer-Larsen and Bang apparently were the right players at the Atlanta
Olympic Games.

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