Jianzi

Jianzi (Chinese: 毽子; pinyin: jiànzi),[Note 1] is a traditional Chinese sport in which players aim to keep a heavily weighted shuttlecock in the air using their bodies apart from the hands, unlike in similar games such as peteca and indiaca.

It can also be played artistically, among a circle of players in a street or park, with the objective to keep the shuttle 'up' and show off skills.

The shuttlecock (called a jianzi in the Chinese game, or 'Chinese hacky sack' and 'kinja' in English) typically has four feathers fixed into a rubber sole or a plastic disc.

The "powerful flat kick" techniques are applied in Chinese games as a major attacking kill.

There are several variations of the game, such as trying to keep the shuttlecock in the air until an agreed number of kicks (e.g. 100) is reached, either alone or in a pair.

Jianzi came to Europe in 1936 when a Chinese athlete from the province of Jiangsu performed a demonstration at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin.

The International Shuttlecock Federation (ISF) was founded in 1999 and the first world championship was organized by Hungary in Újszász in 2000.

Among the members of ISF are China, Taiwan, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, Hungary, Laos, Vietnam, Greece, France, Romania, and Serbia.

On 11 August 2003, delegates from Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Romania, and Serbia founded the Shuttlecock Federation of Europe (S.F.E.)

[8] The official shuttlecock consists of four equal-length goose or duck feathers joined at a rubber or plastic base.