The BWF World Championships is the top-tier tournament in badminton. The sport’s global governing body, the Badminton World Federation (BWF), organises the prestigious Grade 1 tournament every year (except in the Olympic year).
Many of the top-ranked shuttlers come under one roof to emerge as the World Champions of badminton. Apart from the tag, the winners also get a gold medal across all five disciplines.
And a few of these premier shuttlers made it a habit to bag the gold medal edition after edition. Thus far, only three shuttlers have won five or more gold medals in the BWF World Championships.
So, we’ll list the three most successful badminton players in the BWF World Championships.
Lin Dan | China
BWF World Championships Gold Medals: 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2013 (Men’s Singles)
One of the finest men’s singles shuttlers, Lin Dan, clinched the BWF World Championships gold medal a record five times. All of his medals came in the singles category.
The Chinese shuttler is the only singles player to win the gold medal three or more times. Before his top finishes, Dan won the silver in the 2005 edition.
But the next year, he changed the medal’s colours to gold. And he won it every time in his five final appearances in 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, and 2013. Dan added another silver in 2017, taking his total tally to seven medals.
Zhao Yunlei | China
BWF World Championships Gold Medals: 2014, 2015 (Women’s Doubles), 2011, 2014, 2015 (Mixed Doubles)
Another Chinese player on this list, Zhao Yunlei, is one of the best doubles players. She also bagged the gold medal five times along with her women’s and mixed doubles partners.
Yunlei started with a women’s doubles silver in 2009, a bronze in 2010, and added a silver in 2011. But in the 2011 edition, she went on to win gold in the mixed doubles category with her partner Zhang Nan.
Yunlei settled on bronze in both categories in 2013. But she clinched consecutive gold medals in both disciplines in 2014 and 2015, making her the most successful women’s shuttler in the BWF World Championships.
Yunlei grabbed 10 medals in the championships, the most by any shuttler. She also won three medals – two gold and one bronze – in the Summer Olympics.
Park Joo-bong | South Korea
BWF World Championships Gold Medals: 1985, 1991 (Men’s Doubles), 1985, 1989, 1919 (Mixed Doubles)
Park Joo-bong is the only other badminton player to win five or more World Championships titles. The South Korean is one of the greatest doubles shuttlers in the sport’s history.
Joo-bong won a total of seven medals at the Championships, with the first of his coming in 1983. It was a bronze in men’s doubles, which he upgraded to gold in 1985 with Kim Moon-soo. The same year, he also clinched the gold in mixed doubles.
Two years later, Joo-bong settled on the bronze in men’s doubles before grabbing three gold medals. In 1989, the South Korean topped the podium in the mixed category, while he added two golds in 1991 in men’s and mixed doubles, respectively.
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