|
|
30-Dec-07, Rotterdam:
Kaerkkaeinen takes Racketlon
world title in Holland ...
In the World Championship final Finland's Mikko Kaerkkaeinen
beat top seed Magnus Eliasson, holding a 26-point margin
after just three legs.
Having taken a good lead in the table tennis, and a narrow victory
on the badminton court, the squash was particularly interesting as
Kaerkkaeinen went for spectacular nick shots as soon as he got a
good opportunity, and many of them would roll out from the nick with
no chance for Eliasson to retrieve.
The 21-11 figures are remarkable given the 7-21 defeat the fifth
seed suffered only a month ago in Vienna, and such was the Finn's
lead that the the final tennis leg wasn't played.
In the women's final Maria Kakosova proved too strong for her
Finnish opponent, overcoming a narrow loss in the table tennis to
win the badminton and squash legs convincingly before taking the
eight points she needed in the tennis leg.
|
 |
|
Racketlon rules
* You play your opponent in each of the four racket sports (in order)
table tennis, badminton, squash and tennis.
* A match contains four sets of 21 points, one in each sport.
* Point a rally.
* Service changes after two points.
* Winner is not the one that wins most sets but the one that scores
the most points in total. It is possible to lose three out of the
four sets and still win the match.
* The team event contains four singles matches; one ladies' and
three men's. All points count as usual (the winner of the team match
is the team that wins the most points in total)
 |
Try Racketlon in the new year
by Pradeep Vijayakar
 Mumbai:
For a new year a new thought and a new event: Racketlon, which
consists of four rackets sports-tennis, table tennis, badminton and
squash.
I had thrown this idea a decade ago at my club Khar Gymkhana and
`Lucky' Solanki the t.t. secretary had asked me to patent it and
that it could go on to be an Olympic sport. If they could have a
modern pentathlon which has diverse events like riding and running
why not a Racketlon which has racket-related events?
Well I could not do much. But there were others too who were
thinking along those lines as I found out when I recently received
an email about a Racketlon World Championship. But it was in Dutch
and I could not make head or tail of it.
On probing I found out that a Racketlon World Championship has been
in place for seven years now and the Seventh event was in Rotterdam,
Holland in the last week of 2007. Marc Veldkamp, ex-Dutch Squash No
four was the tournament director.
The men's event was won by Finland's Mikko Kärkkäinen who won his
fourth World championship title defeating Magnus Eliasson in the
final. A fairytale finish was not to be as Mikko's girlfriend
Michaela Björnström lost the women's final to Martina Kakosova from
the Czech Republic. The Finns had won the mixed doubles title at he
the first world doubles in Austria in November. Austria's Christoph
Krenn and Michael Dicker won the men's doubles and Czech Republic's
Pelikanova/Lubasova the women's.
The team event at Rotterdam went to Sweden, as did the Veterans
(+45), which was won by Peter Bittar.
Kärkkäinen won all the first three sports and the match was over
before tennis. This victory made Kärkkäinen the best Racketlon
player ever with four world championship titles, one more than
Eliasson.
The rest of the medals and prize money went to Swedes. Christian
Wall surprised everyone and took Bronze, just before evergreen
Rickard Persson.
That the future is bright for the future is evident from the fact
that at junior level, different countries hit the top spots:
Austria, Finland, Poland and Estonia who harvested medals in the
Junior boys and girls events.
Lukas Trojan from Austria won boys u16, Antti Tyässka from Finland
the u21. In the girls victory went to Sylwia Borek (Pol) and the
only medal for North America went to Pimmika Fernando from Canada.
In seniors, Sweden too the fifth world title in a row, beating
Germany in the final. The Bronze medal went to Finland who knocked
out the surprise team of the tournament Netherlands in the match for
3rd place.
After five World championships Sweden stay unbeaten in national team
matches.
|
 |
 |
|
Final day results:
Complete draws & results
Racketlon matches consist
of 4 games to 21 in Table Tennis, Badminton, Squash and Tennis
MEN'S ELITE
Semifinals:
Magnus Eliasson (Swe) bt Rickard Persson (Swe)
+16 (tt:13-21 ba:21-8 sq:21-8 te:4-6)
Mikko Kaerkkaeinen (Fin) bt Christian Wall (Swe)
+25 (1-21, 21-16, 19-21, -)
Final: Kaerkkaeinen bt Eliasson
+26 (21-8, 21-18, 21-11, -)
LADIES' ELITE
Semifinals:
Maria Kakosova (Cze) bt Linda Jansson (Swe)
+16 (21-18, 21-16, 21-10, 3-6)
Michaela Bjoernstrand (Fin) bt Susanna Lautala-Naeykki (Fin)
+11 (19-21, 14-21, 21-9, 19-11)
Final: Kakosova bt Bjoernstrand
+12 (18-21, 21-16, 21-9, 8-10)
MEN'S VETERAN
Semifinals:
Ulf Bredberg (Swe) bt Jacob de Vriis (POR)
+7 (21-5, 8-21, 8-21, 21-4)
Peter Bittar (Swe) bt Anders Lundstroem (Fin)
W/O
Final: Bittar bt Bredberg
+27 (21-9, 21-10, 21-17, -) |
|
