Lauren Smith has been celebrating after claiming a superb fifth straight English Badminton Championship title.

The Cumbrian – alongside partner Sarah Walker – beat Chloe Birch, a former partner of Smith’s, and Jess Pugh 21-10, 21-10 on their way to victory at the weekend.

Smith was delighted to maintain her stranglehold with another women’s doubles title in Wycombe and she will hope to build on the win with plenty more competitions coming up before the end of the year.

She said: “We’re both really pleased to have won at the weekend. We focused really well, especially in the final.

“The Nationals are quite different to most other tournaments, you play people you know. We train with Jess and Chloe every day, so the games can always be tricky.”

Smith and Walker came into the event on the back of a second-round defeat in the BWF World Championships, which were played in Glasgow last month.

The pair were beaten by Koreans Jung Kyung-eun and Shin Seung-chan after defeating Germans Lisa Kaminski and Hannah Pohl.

But the Commonwealth Games silver and bronze medallist got back to winning ways at the national event. She has now won national women’s doubles gold with three different partners – Walker, Heather Olver and Gabby Adcock.

On playing with Walker, Smith said: “I’m definitely enjoying playing with Sarah.

“We get on really well and take the time to analyse and learn from all our matches. It feels like we’re going from strength-to-strength and we have a positive future.”

Smith, who won European Badminton Championships bronze in the women’s doubles in Denmark this year alongside Walker, says it’s something she will “look back on fondly” when she retires.

But, for the moment, the 25-year-old from Longtown is preparing for the busy forthcoming schedule she has got.

“I’m really proud to have won my fifth title, it’ll be something I look back on fondly when I retire,” she told The Cumberland News .

“Hopefully, there’s a few more titles to win before then.

“It was very busy leading up to the Worlds but we were sharp from a high level of training and now we’re making sure we carry that forward into a busy block.

“We’ve got eight tournaments in Europe before Christmas.”