Indiaca
Indiaca is a form of the Brazilian game peteca popular in Europe. It is played on court across a net with similar rules to volleyball but instead of a ball, a large shuttlecock, sometimes also called an indiaca, or featherball is used; this consists of four goose feathers attached to a heavier base, and it is controlled using the hands. In this way, indiaca differs from jiànzi (or featherball), a very similar game originating in China, where the shuttlecock is controlled with the feet. Indiaca can be played by two individual players facing each other, or by small teams.
Origins
Records showed that in the past Indiaca was practiced by native Brazilian Indians as a recreation, even before the Portuguese arrived. This was passed successively through generationsin Brazil.
In the V Olympic games held in Antwerp, capital of Belgium, in 1920, the Brazilians who first participated in an Olympics, led Petecas for warming up their athletes, attracting numerous athletes from other countries interested in the practice. Finnish Coaches and athletes Frepeatadly asked Dr. Maria José Castelo Branco, head of the Brazilian delegation, about the rules of the sport and showed great interest in this activity. Then in the state of Minas Gerais the first official rules were written and internal competitions were held in clubs with the pioneers Peteca players of Belo Horizonte.
Peteca left the streets, the grass and the sand to became a field sport in Belo Horizonte, in the 1940s.
In 1973 the Indiaca Federation of Minas Gerais - FEMP was founded, confirming the pioneering spirit of a sport born and developed among the Brazilian people. As positive support, there are many publications such as books, magazines, newsletters, brochures and reports that emphasize the advantages of the practice of this sport and that can be played by children and adults regardless of age, being healthy and attractive to both genres.
In Belo Horizonte, the latest public competitions held in shoppingmall arenas, organized into six blocks counted with ca. 3,500 athletes.
Indiaca is also played in Paraguay, Bolivia, Chile, United States, Portugal, Holland, France, Germany, Switzerland, Estonia, Lithuania, Russia, China and Japan etc.
The rules of the game are not the same worldwide. In Brazil, for example, Peteca is played with a maximum of two player pro team. In Germany a team can have 5 players.