It’s been well over two years since we last held an IWT Swiss Open, but the time has finally come for the FIR World Tour to return to VITIS Sportcenter. This is the 12th time that this tournament has taken place, so we thought we’d delve into the history books to see how it’s gone in the past.
IWT Swiss Open Roll of Honour: Men’s Singles
Both the men’’ and women’s singles have had a glistening array of winners since the first tournament back in 2007.
Only two players have won the men’s singles twice; Austrian duo Michi Dickert and Christoph Krenn. Krenn triumphed in 2008 and 2011. Dickert’s success came more recently, with the current Austrian national champion taking home the title in 2014 and 2016. Dickert actually is one of only a handful of players to have won the men’s singles, doubles and mixed doubles titles in Switzerland – but more on that later.
Only two Swiss players have ever lifted the trophy in their home country; Stefan Jezler in 2009 and Patrick Lorenz in 2017. It’s a credit to them both that they’re the only two male Swiss players to ever reach the final – so Swiss players do boast a 100% success rate in men’s singles finals.
Germany’s Elmar Schaub was the first to triumph in 2007, beating Michi Dickert in a nail-biting final. The other one-time champions that we haven’t mentioned are all elite world champions of one sort or another.
Stefan Adamsson won in 2010, Jesper Ratzer in 2012, Thorsten Deck in 2015 and, most recently, Kresten Hougaard beat Arnaud Genin in 2019. Adamsson and Ratzer are singles world champions while Deck and Hougaard have both lifted the men’s doubles world title in recent years.
He may only have two titles but Michi Dickert has reached more IWT Swiss Open finals than any other man. Dickert won in 2014 and 2016 but also lost out in finals to Schaub in 2007 and Ratzer in 2012.
None of the previous winners are competing in the 2021 IWT Swiss Open so we’re guaranteed a new name on the roll of honour. We’ll know who it’s going to be on Sunday 22nd August.
IWT Swiss Open Roll of Honour: Women’s Singles
When it comes to the women’s singles champions, Silke Altmann and Astrid Reimer-Kern are the only two with multiple successes. Altmann won the title in back-to-back years in 2008 and 2009 while Reimer-Kern is the current two-time defending champion, having triumphed in 2017 and 2019.
Altmann in particular has a phenomenal record at the IWT Swiss Open. Not only did she win in 2008 and 2009, but she also reached the final in 2011 and 2019. Those two singles titles are accompanied by five more doubles titles.
There’s a lot of similarities between the men’s and women’s singles champions. The next is that there have also been two Swiss champions; Beatrice Walser and Nicole Eisler. Walser won the first-ever edition of the event back in 2007 while Eisler had to wait until 2015 to get her hands on the trophy.
The list of other champions is basically a who’s who of racketlon legends. Michaela Bjornstrom, Isabelle Bramhall, Zuzana Kubanova, Nathalie Vogel and Christine Seehofer have all triumphed between 2010 and 2016 – showing the popularity and high-quality nature of this field every year.
Reimer-Kern has already made history by becoming the first player to reach three consecutive IWT Swiss Open elite singles finals. The question now is whether she can go a step further in 2021 and make it four. Could she also join an exclusive list of players in winning the same FIR World Tour title three times in a row?
IWT Swiss Open Roll of Honour: Doubles and Multiple Champions
Speaking of winning the title three times in a row, let’s have a little look at the history of doubles at the tournament. Incredibly, two players have won a doubles title three times in a row. Michi Dickert won the Men’s Doubles in 2011, 2012 and 2014 – twice alongside Christoph Krenn and once with Nico Hobi. For the record, the IWT Swiss Open did not happen in 2013 and 2018 due to Switzerland hosting the World Championships instead, and also in 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Natalie Paul has also achieved a similar feat in the mixed doubles. The German won from 2014 through 2016, twice with Dickert and once with Jesper Hougaard.
Just four players in tournament history have managed to successfully win all three available elite titles. Swiss stars Nicole Eisler and Patrick Lorenz have won one singles, one doubles, and one mixed doubles title. While Eisler won the singles in 2015, it was 2017 where she won the women’s doubles alongside Dara Ladner and mixed alongside Lorenz.
Lorenz produced the coveted Triple Slam in 2017, winning the mixed with Eisler, the singles title and the men’s doubles with Michael Strassle. After lifting the singles, doubles and mixed doubles in the same year, Michi Dickert also achieved the Triple Slam three years earlier.
Dickert has won the joint-highest total of elite titles at the IWT Swiss Open with seven, accumulating two singles, three doubles, and two mixed doubles titles. Silke Altmann is the other player to have lifted seven, with the exact same spread of trophies. Her most recent success came in 2019 where she won the mixed doubles crown alongside Dan Busby.
2021 IWT Swiss Open: Who Will Join the Roll of Honour?
The big question now is which players will add their names to the roll of honour this weekend. We already know that there will be a new men’s singles winner. In the women’s, Astrid Reimer-Kern and Nicole Eisler could add to their tally or a new name could be written into the history books.
Follow all the action on our Facebook and Instagram pages, as well as on Racketlon.net.
You can track the results across the weekend here.
The full 2021 IWT Swiss Open draws are available here.
You can enter any 2021 FIR World Tour tournament here.
Sam Barker / FIR Media Officer
Image Credit / Rene Zwald
