14 Dec 2011 at 13:35 | Published by: Hans | Views: 15063 | News search

Stephanie Kern and Michel Rhyn, winners in Kloten  (Photo by Bengt Svensson 2011)

Reported by Norbert Nolte

After the 30 hours tournament earlier this fall the IHM was the second tournament in Kloten this winter. A lot of good players made it a high level tournament in almost all categories.

On Saturday four rounds were played and on Sunday first two rounds and then two rounds for the best 50 percent. In the ladies category all Swiss national team players participated in the tournament. Last year’s winner Reby Weber, European Champion 2010, played the same score than last year, but this time that was not enough. This since the stroke play world champion Stefanie Kern, playing first time in Kloten, beat her by 3 points. One and two point behind Reby Jacqueline Arlitt and Sonja Viatte got the third and fourth place.

In the men’s category there was the same winner as last year. The winner of lots of tournaments in Kloten, Vitus Spescha was beaten by the 2005 world champion Michel Rhyn. After six rounds Vitus had a comfortable lead of five points but in the last two rounds Michel played 49 and Vitus only 55. Also Gerhard Leitner on place three was a surprise after place 13 last year.

The junior’s winner of the last year and number three in 30 hours tournament Beat Wartenweiler was this year beaten by the German juniors champion Thomas Höfler. In a hard fight Thomas was leading by two before the last round and then both played 24 in the last round.

In the female juniors category the first three from the Swiss championship where beaten by two young German girls, who got second and fourth position in the girls category (younger than juniors) of the German Championship. Lena Hengstler won by one point, because in the last round she played 26 and Sarah Schumacher played a 37. Then there was a big gap of 15 points to Tamara Nydegger, who got the third place.

Heinz Fischer, runner up last year, got an easy victory by five points before Hans Stolt in the senior’s category. After a 23 in round six he had a comfortable lead and with two times 27 nobody else had a chance. In the female seniors, the European matchplay champion Heidi Stricker played a solid 27.0 tournament, but was beaten by Esther Wicky, who played a very good 25.6, only one point more than the winner of the men’s category.

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