28 August 2025
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The Scottish badminton community came together yesterday for a brilliant event – and smashed a world record.
After a few (well, a lot!) of false starts, the record for the most participants in a single badminton rally was beaten by players who travelled to Glasgow from as far afield as Elgin, Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Perth, Dumfries and Melrose!
The record – set by a club in Japan earlier this month – was 129. But our players didn’t just beat it – they annihilated it with 157 participants!
In all, around 200 players turned up at the Emirates Arena in Glasgow and everyone took part. The serve for the successful rally was hit by Down’s Syndrome player Ross Ferrando, with the 157th and final successful shot hit by Yulian Zhai, 80-year-old mother of our Regional Development Officer and former Scotland internation Rita Gao!
Players of all ages – from four to 80 (thank you Yulian) - and standards from beginners to members of our Performance Squad joined together to take on the challenge. And there was plenty of fun and games afterwards, with wipeout, beat the pro and an exhibition doubles match.
It was a brilliant day, and thanks so much to everyone who turned up and/or donated to our charity partner for the event, Down’s Syndrome Scotland.
The event was to launch ticket sales for this year’s Scottish Open, being held at the Emirates in November. All individual members of Badminton Scotland are entitled to 2 FREE tickets for Thursday 20 November and half price tickets for all other days (limited to 2 of each type of ticket per member). To take advantage of this offer visit our Scottish Open Eventbrite page and enter the promo code Member25 BEFORE adding any tickets to your basket.
The JustGiving page for yesterday’s event will remain open for another couple of days so, if you haven’t donated already – and huge thanks to those who have – please show your support and appreciation for the players who took part yesterday by doing so here.
Thanks also to Glasgow Life for donating the hall to us for the event, and to our corporate sponsor for the day, LHH Recruitment.
And BIG thanks to our sponsor Victor for providing loads of goodies, including sweatbands, grips and shirts, to give away.
Anyone who missed our live stream of the day can watch it here on our YouTube channel, with the record-breaking rally beginning at 48:45.
Keep your eyes peeled on our website over the next few days for more photos!