Left- vs right-handed badminton slice shots: opposite shuttlecock spinning and Magnus effect

Abstract

The chiral nature of a badminton shuttlecock is responsible for its anti-clockwise spinning as it naturally propagates through the air. This induces a dissymmetry between left-handed and right-handed players and the resulting trajectories of the shuttlecock, which were captured in real condition on the badminton court and in slow-motion at 3700 fps. The videos clearly evidence this dissymmetry as slice shots performed by righties accelerate the natural anti-clockwise spinning, while the one performed by lefties induces a clockwise to anti-clockwise spinning, making trajectories of shuttlecocks different. The slow-motion videos also caught a brief Magnus effect, often neglected in badminton, lifting up the shuttlecock for both lefties and righties and affecting the effectiveness of the slice shot.