Author: fir

The third edition of the Antwerp Open was the first time at International World Tour level. This brought a no less than 120 players to the venue of Tennis Club Hove. In the Men Elite, the first match already brought a first surprise. First seed Kasper Jønsson had to withdraw after only 2 points of squash due to a knee injury. In the other matches the seeded players Peter Duyck, Cedric Junillon and Dan Busby did what was expected of them. Even if we must say that Richard Middleton gave Peter a hard time, pushing him to a thrilling tennis match. Peter had no more than a 2 point margin in the end. The fourth semi-finalist was Mohammed Tarik Koubaa. After the withdrawal of Kasper he demonstrated his skills with a win before tennis against Korbinian Heim to face Belgian start Duyck in the semifinal. The final was a replay of last year’s final. Peter Duyck against Dan Busby. Would Peter be able to win the Antwerp Open for the third time? As expected Peter was strong in the table tennis and took a 21-10 win. Smart and solid badminton brought Dan back with a 21-17 win. Peter fought for all he was worth in squash, but could not salvage more than 7 points. Peter knew it was going to be hard to keep Dan under 15 in Tennis. It was a tight game, but at 16-15 Busby could celebrate his first Antwerp Open victory.

In the Womens elite First seed Lieselot De Bleeckere was going for home victory. Wins over Hélène Lechemolle and last year’s winner Anastasiya Bruzgina brought her to the final. In the other half of the draw second seed Nicole Eisler moved to the final with comfortable wins over Jennifer Schmitz and Anouk Dols. Everybody knew this was going to be an exciting and tight final. Table tennis could have gone either side, but Lieselot managed to take the smallest margin with a 22-20 win. In Badminton she showed that she has made a lot of progression with a 21-9 victory. Nicole started a comeback with 14-21 win in squash. She managed to win her first world tour title of 2017 with a 21-11 tennis win.

Mixed doubles was won by Lieselot De Bleeckere and Kasper Jønsson. Women’s doubles title went to Anastasiya Bruzgina and Jennifer Schmits, winning by just one point agains Kirsten Kaptein and Nicole Eisler. Men’s doubles victory was for Peter Duyck and Dan Busby, beating surprise finalists Guus Van De Burgt and Alwin Krist. Youngsters Luka Penttinen and Senne Blommaert showed them that they are getting closer to the top by taking third place. All results are online on fir.tournamentsoftware.com

Hans Abbelos
Tournament Director

Sweden made a clean sweep by winning all the Elite draws in the Finnish Open in Helsinki. In the Men’s Elite  3rd seed Sebastian Hedlund first beat wild card Alexander Lipczynski of Sweden and then 1st seed Benjamin Hampl of Switzerland. While Luka Penttinen defeated Sweden’s Michael Persson, then had a walk over and beat Arturs Zaicevs of Latvia in the semis. The final was well contested match where the Swede had the upper hand and took the Finnish title by 5 points. (credit: Racketlon Finland)
The Women’s Elite saw a surprise winner in unseeded Swede Emmie Danielson who beat topseeded Esther Dübendorfer of Switzerland after having lost squash by 1-21. All draws are online on fir.tournamentsoftware.com

Men’s Elite doubles was a tight affair, but again Sweden drew the longer staw when Ola Emriksson and Michael Persson clinched the titel with a 3 points victory over topseeded Benjamin Hampl and Luka Penttinen.

The Mixed produced the only double winners of the tournament when Emmie Danielsson and Michael Persson took the title. Switzerland’s Esther Dübendorfer and Benjamin Hampl took the second place.

Men’s B was won by Oliver Bühler from Switzerland and Women’s 40+ by Esther DübendorferI. In all other classes there was a Finnish winner.

Poku Salo
Tournament Director

On 27th and 28th October Murau was the location of the last international tournament of Racketlon in Austria this year. Michael Wölfl, the president of the Racketlon Team Murau, was glad to welcome more than 30 participants. As last year Christine Seehofer and Lukas Windischberger took the first place in the Elite Events. All results are online on fir.tournamentsoftware.com

Christine Seehofer, the world number one, won all her matches without playing Tennis. 2nd place reached Bettina Bugl and Elisabeth Seehofer completed the podium with taking the 3rd place. Newcomer Jacqueline Mariacher closed the Woman A event with the 4th place.

The big favorite in Men A was Lukas Windischberger because Michael Dickert had to cancel his participation due to an illness. The world number one played almost a perfect tournament. Luki was able to win all his 3 matches before tennis. Surprising Matija Mikac from Croatia took the Advantage of a good draw in the lower half for reaching the 2nd place. The small final was played between Bernd Jaschke and Frank Eichkitz. In the end Bernd Jaschke was happy to take the bronze medal. (credit: Tournament Director)

In Men B the 4th seeded Patrick Flandorfer surprised with his first victory in Murau. In the final Horst Schwarzenberger had no chance, but he was very satisfied with his 2nd place. Kim Niederhausen from Germany was the winner of the small final against the croatian Marijan Stepan.

8 Players participated in Men C Event which was dominated by Björn Sattler. He won the final against his Tennis colleague Alexander Bogensperger. A happy Daniel Lercher took the 3rd place.

At the price giving ceremony,which was held by the former World Champion Christoph Krenn, Michael Wölfl, said “Thank you” to all participants for coming. A big honor to all supporters, sponsors and helpers for executing this tournament. The Racketlon Team Murau is looking forward to seeing al lot of players at the next international tournament in Murau.

Michael Wölfl
Tournament Director

80 players from 17 different countries travelled to the 3rd IWT Malta Open from 6th to 8th October in search of a great Racketlon experience – as the Malta Open (alongside its cousin the Club La Santa Open) are unique events on the FIR World Tour. They offer the players far more than just a tournament. They offer a mix of serious Racketlon competition, beautiful surroundings, great facilities, perfect weather and the chance to enjoy a true holiday experience. All results are now online on fir.tournamentsoftware.com

On Court

On the court, the women’s elite draw saw two time defending champion Amke Fischer from Germany suffer an ankle injury during the badminton set of her first match against the quickly improving Zuzana Severinova from the Czech Republic. This immediately opened things up resulting in a final between Zuzana (who also defeated GB’s rising star Hannah Boden) and Astrid Reimer-Kern, who had come past Nicole Eisler and Katrin Maldre.

In the final Astrid nicked the TT 21-18, before Zuzana came back with a solid 21-14  win in the badminton. In order to give herself a chance Zuzana needed to try and somehow make things awkward on the squash court for Astrid to try and leave Astrid needing double figures at tennis (Zuzana’s best sport).

However Astrid’s prowess on the squash court was simply too much and the 21-3 win left her only needing 8 at tennis which she reached with the scores 8-8 to record a very well deserved Malta Open title.

In the Men’s Elite draw, the opening rounds all went with the seedings, as the top 4 seeds all reached the semi finals which saw Morten Jaksland play Dan Busby and Kresten Hougaard (credit:tournament organisation) play tournament director Duncan Stahl. In the first semi, Morten played a very solid opening two sports winning 21-12, 21-18 leaving Dan with a lot to do and even a 21-7 win at squash still left Dan needing 19 at tennis which proved 5 points too many as Morten won 21-14 to move into his first Malta final.

At various points over the years, Kresten and Duncan have both beaten each other at all 4 sports and generally their matches have always come down to just a few points – so their matches are famously very hard to predict! However, this time around Kresten was too sharp in their Sat evening match winning 21-14, 21-16, 21-17, 6-9 to set up an all Danish Sunday final against Morten.

Once again Kresten, who is now based in Malta, looked very sharp in the Sunday lunchtime Final taking the first 3 sports 21-18, 21-12, 21-18 leaving him just 7 points to win the title. Kresten made light work of what could have been a tricky 7 points to win and at 7-7, the Malta Open title was his.

Two all French finals in both the Women’s and Men’s B saw Loic Cencig overcome compatriot Jean-Brice Montagnon and Helene Lechemolle beat Dorothee Gazeau. The Men’s C saw Volker Sach (in what might have been his 33rd match of the weekend) triumph over the irrepressible French dynamo, Fabien Mauroy.

In the vets, the mighty Rickard Persson (who by the way has now played a Racketlon tournament in 17 different countries – can that be beaten?) was too strong winning the 40+ with ease, while Radu Ionescu won a very tight final against Manfred Grab in the 50+ final.

There were other notable wins for Dan Busby and Hannah Boden in the Mixed elite doubles (on a gummi arm) and for Phil Todd and Steffen Neumann in the Men’s B doubles.

Off Court

As is traditional at the Malta Open, all the extras around the tournament are a real highlight: with players able to relax under palm trees by the huge pool area in between their matches, enjoy a Fri BBQ, a player’s party until the sun came up on Sunday morning , a traditional Sunday lunch and an amazing all day boat trip to the beautiful island of Comino and the Blue Lagoon.

All reasons why the Malta Open remains the friendliest, most sociable and enjoyable tournament on the World Tour!

Duncan Stahl
Tournament Director