About Us
Richard Vaughan founded the Brisbane Badminton Academy (BBA). He is a former World number six, former British number one singles players for a decade before moving to Australia in 2016.
Richard was elected as the Vice President for the Badminton World Federation (BWF) in 2023. Richard’s main roles are:
- Vice President – Badminton World Federation (2023 – present)
- Director – The Sports Consultancy (2021 – present)
- Chief Executive Officer – Squash Australia (2015-2021)
- Chief Executive Officer – Badminton Ireland (2011-2015)
- Performance Consultant (2008 – present)
- Olympian 1998 - 2008
For more about Richard Vaughan see his page here www.RichardVaughan.net.
Badminton Background
Richard was Europe’s top junior before a bad injury at eighteen which threatened his career, despite this he fought back and got to the Last 16 of the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games beating former World No2 Boonsak Ponsana (Thailand), and Swedish No1 Rasmus Wengberg before losing in a close match with World No1 and World Champion Sun Jun. Richard won a Bronze medal at the European Championships the same year losing to Denmark Peter Gade in the semifinal.
At World number six after winning a bronze medal at the Manchester 2002 Commonwealth Games where he beat India’s World No2 Gupta (India), former World No3 Ronald Susilo (Singapore), before losing to Malaysian Tseun Seng in the semi-final. After this event Richard had a career threatening hip injury, despite this he qualified for the Athens 20024 Olympic Games beating top ten players Hashim (Malaysia), Sato (Japan), Yeoh Kay Bin (Malaysia), Sasaki (Japan), Yamada (Japan), and World Champion Xia Xuanze (China).
Richard is a Badminton World Federation Tutor and qualified to BWF Level 2 in Australia.
Richard has coached for many top nations in support of their Olympic programmes in the UK, Ireland, Spain, Australia, Badminton Europe, and the Badminton World Federation where he managed their Road to London and Road to Rio programmes which included multiple Olympic athletes.