Han Aiping

Han Aiping, born on 22 April 1962 and died on 16 October 2019, was a Chinese badminton player of the 1980s who ranks among the greats of the women's game, noted for her superb overhead strokes. With her teammate, rival and sometimes doubles partner Li Lingwei she dominated international singles play for most of the decade. Han won the World Championships three times, in 1979, 1985 and 1987, and the World Cup twice, in 1983 and 1988, took the Asian Games title once, and led Chinese teams to victory in Uber Cup competitions. She began training at ten in Wuhan, joined the Hubei provincial team at twelve and the Chinese national team at sixteen, and at 17 won the 1979 singles title of a rival world federation that China then backed. Hyperthyroidism kept her out of competition for two years from 1980. In the exhibition tournament at the 1988 Seoul Olympics she lost a close final to South Korea's Hwang Hye-young.