Victor Lai beat Jason Gunawan 21-11, 21-14 in Yeosu, South Korea, on Sunday to become the first Canadian ever to win the Korea Open, closing a gruelling week with a straight-games final at Jinnam Stadium. The title was his second on the BWF World Tour this season, after the Indonesia Open in June, and iimiTV’s breaking report on the Korea Open final has the full story of the week, from the opening win over fellow Canadian Brian Yang to the comeback semi-final against Lee Cheuk Yiu.
FINAL: Victor Lai 21-11, 21-14, Jason Gunawan
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How to watch: Victor Lai vs Yudai Okimoto, Wednesday, November 11, 2026, at Kumamoto Prefectural Gymnasium, Kumamoto, Japan
Stream: BWF TV
BWF TV’s official coverage of Sunday’s final, the full match from Jinnam Stadium:
Third In The Race To The World Tour Finals
What settled overnight is where the Yeosu title leaves him. The BWF’s official World Tour Finals rankings now put Victor Lai third in the men’s singles race on 77,720 points, up four places on the back of the Korea Open. Denmark’s Anders Antonsen holds second on 77,930, just 210 points ahead of him, and France’s Christo Popov leads the race on 84,230. Behind Lai, Indonesia’s Alwi Farhan sits fourth on 76,400, so the Super 500 title did more than add a second trophy to his season: it moved him from the edge of the race into its top three.
The man he beat in the final moved too. Gunawan’s run to the Yeosu final lifted him two places to 15th on 63,760 points, still outside the qualifying places. The Finals take the top eight players in each discipline and run from December 9 to 13 in China, so third place with two events left is a strong position, not a locked one: the gap from Lai down to Koki Watanabe in eighth is under 10,000 points, and every man from fourth to eighth is still playing the same two tournaments he is.
Lai’s own verdict on Sunday, given to BWF after the final, was about surviving the week rather than the table it changed: “Although it might have been straight games, all my matches have been long, gruelling games. I’m very happy that I stayed focused and I didn’t waver in my confidence too much.” BWF TV’s official highlights of the final:
Okimoto Again, Three Days Later In Kumamoto
There is no rest built into the calendar. The Korea Open left just two tournaments in the Finals qualification race: the Kumamoto Masters and the Hong Kong Open. The Kumamoto Masters, another Super 500, opened today at the Kumamoto Prefectural Gymnasium and runs from November 10 to 15, and Lai goes in as the fourth seed. His first-round opponent is a familiar one: the BWF draw pairs Lai with Japan’s Yudai Okimoto, the man he beat in the Korea Open quarter-finals on Friday. The official Kumamoto prospectus holds every Yeosu finalist’s first-round match to Wednesday, so Lai opens on November 11, three days after lifting the Korea trophy.
Okimoto is not a soft first match of the week. Lai’s 21-19, 21-12 quarter-final win in Yeosu was framed by the BWF’s own quarter-final report as revenge: Okimoto, the Taipei Open champion, had beaten him in the Canada Open semi-final in July on the way to that title, and he has already shown he can take Lai’s measure when the rallies lengthen. Whoever wins in Kumamoto takes the season series lead and, on Lai’s side of the ledger, protects third place in the race.
Yudai Okimoto, pictured at the 2025 Kaohsiung Masters, meets Lai again in Kumamoto three days after losing their Korea Open quarter-final. Photo: Tony2803.tw, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
After Kumamoto, the Hong Kong Open, from November 17 to 22 at Kai Tak Arena, is the last stop in the race before the Finals field is set. Lai’s season has already delivered back-to-back World Championship bronze medals, a Super 1000 title and now a Super 500. The next two weeks decide whether it also delivers a place at the Finals, and on the evidence of Yeosu, third in the race is his to lose.
