Kim Thorsgaard Jensen
The organizer of the VII Brunswick Madrid Challenge has decided to extend the duration of the tournament from 8 to 9 days, since they will add a squad on Saturday in the weekend before the main tournament week.
This means that the tournament period will change from 30 June – 7 July 2019 to 29 June – 7 July 2019. The tournament will as always be conducted in Bowling Chamartín.
Bowling Chamartín will in 2019 additionally host the EBT Masters 2019, which will be conducted on Thursday 4 July 2019 during the main week of the VII Brunswick Madrid Challenge.
Click here to see the EBT 2019 Calendar.
The classic Irish Open Championships was conducted on 13-20 January 2019, as always in Leisureplex Stillorgan in Dublin.
The tournament was this time conducted under the name, the 31st Irish Open Championships in association with Storm, 900 Global and 3G Shoes, as the 3rd stop of the EBT 2019.
The tournament, which appeared in the tour in 2005 and 2006, returned in 2015, so the 2019 issue of the Irish Open Championships represents the 7th appearance in the EBT.
A total of 196 athletes, which was 150 men and 46 women, had found their way to Leisureplex Stillorgan to compete for the 62 available spots for the final steps of the tournament.
Step 1 included 54 bowlers playing 3 games starting from scratch, Step 2 included 32 bowlers playing 3 games starting from scratch and Step 3 included 16 bowlers playing 2 games matches in a pyramid system including Eighth Finals, Quarter Finals, Semi Finals and a Final.
The outcome of the three last matches became as follows:
Semi Final 1
Jamie Elliott, England: 205 + 190 = 395
Glen Richardson, England: 190 + 196 = 386
Semi Final 2
Steven Gill, Scotland: 224 + 222 = 446
Anthony Simonsen, USA: 219 + 211 = 430 (The winner in 2018)
Final
Jamie Elliott, England: 254 + 208 = 462
Steven Gill, Scotland: 244 + 184 = 428
Jamie Elliott from England won his first tour stop title and became at the same time, also for the first time, the highest ranked in the men’s division, while Denise Blankenzee from The Netherlands became the highest ranked in the women’s division, also for the fist time.
Cherie Tan from Singapore is leading the women’s division of the tour with 350 points in front of two of her fellow countrywomen, Bernice Lim at position 2 with 285 points and Daphne Tan at position 3 with 225 points.
Kim Bolleby from Thailand is leading the men’s division of the tour with 234 points in front of Jesse Kallio from Finland at position 2 with 220 points and Joonas Jehkinen from Finland at position 3 with 200 points.
Click here to see the ranking in the Women’s Division
Click here to see the ranking in the Men’s Division
The European Bowling Tour is running in its 20th season, and in just as many occasions the famous Brunswick Ballmaster Open has been adopted in the tour; something no other tournament in the tour can match.
This year’s issue of the tournament was as always bowled in the spectacular Tali Bowl in Helsinki, where a total of not less than 538 athletes (436 men and 102 women) took part.
The number of athletes is the second highest number ever taking part in a tour stop, only passed by the 550 athletes, which entered Brunswick Ballmaster Open in 2018.
36 of these athletes continued to the first step of the final, which were athletes positioned 13-40 from the general standing, top 3 from a separate standing of Squad 1-8, top 2 from a separate standing of Squad 9-10 and top 3 from the Desperado Squad. The 36 athletes played 6 games starting from scratch Saturday night.
Step 2 of the final included athletes positioned 1-12 from the general standing combined with top 24 from step 1. The 36 athletes played 8 games Sunday morning starting from scratch.
Top 16 from the final step 2 was divided in two groups of 8 athletes, each playing 7 one game Round Robin matches with 30 bonus points for a won match and 15 bonus points for a tied.
Everything were added together: the 8 games in the final step 2 + the 7 Round Robin games + Round Robin bonus + women’s handicap to determine the two best athletes from each group to be qualified for the Semi Finals in the Final step 4 of the tournament.
Group 1: The two highest after 15 games plus various bonuses:
1. 3738: Cherie Tan, Singapore
2. 3595: Petteri Salonen, Finland
Group 2: The two highest after 15 games plus various bonuses:
1. 3661: Joonas Jehkinen, Finland
2. 3645: Jesse Kallio, Finland
Semi Final 1
Cherie Tan, Singapore: 264
Jesse Kallio, Finland: 200
Semi Final 2
Joonas Jehkinen, Finland: 248
Petteri Salonen, Finland: 231
The Final
Cherie Tan, Singapore: 213
Joonas Jehkinen, Finland: 234
Cherie Tan, who was in her second EBT Stop Final in 8 days, became the highest ranked women in a tour stop for the 3rd time in her career, while Jonas Jehkinen became the highest ranked man in a tour stop for the 2nd time in his career.
It was indeed also the second tour stop title for Joonas Jehkinen, since he won his first title at the Track Dream-Bowl Palace Open by Erdinger in 2013.
Cherie Tan from Singapore is leading the women’s division of the tour with 350 points in front of two of her fellow countrywomen, Bernice Lim at position 2 with 250 points and Daphne Tan at position 3 with 225 points.
Kim Bolleby from Thailand is leading the men’s division of the tour with 234 points in front of Jesse Kallio from Finland at position 2 with 220 points and Joonas Jehkinen from Finland at position 3 with 200 points.
Click here to see the ranking in the Women’s Division
Click here to see the ranking in the Men’s Division
One of Europe’s surely classic tournaments, the AIK International Tournament Powered by Track, appeared for the second time in the EBT, when the tournament was conducted over the year change 2018-2019.
A little more than 900 entries were bowled in the tournament, which as always were conducted in Bowl-O-Rama in Stockholm, Sweden.
The format offered a Semi Final Saturday night for 56 athletes, of which 12 was continuing to the Final Step 1, where another 44 athletes were waiting to continue their performances.
In the first step Sunday morning 48 athletes bowled 6 games from scratch, from where 24 athletes were joined by Top 8 from the qualification standing to bowl another 6 games starting from scratch in Step 2.
Step 3 continued with the best 16 from Step 2 bowling 4 games, this time with the 6 games pin fall from Step 2 carried forward, further continuing into Step 4 for the 8 best playing 4 more games, still carrying the pin falls from the previous two steps forward; to accumulate a total over 14 games.
The standing among the 8 athletes after 14 games became as follows:
1. Kim Bolleby, Thailand: 3372
2. Teemu Putkisto, Finland: 3273
3. Cherie Tan, Singapore: 3267
4. William Svensson, Sweden: 3257
5. Robert Lindberg, Sweden: 3256
6. Filip Wilhelmsson, Sweden: 3203
7. Francois Louw, South Africa: 3157
8. Shayna Ng, Singapore: 3068
Top 3 concluded the tournaments with two one game stepladder matches as follows:
Match 1: Teemu Putkisto vs. Cherie Tan: 166 vs. 223
Match 2: Kim Bolleby vs. Cherie Tan: 227 vs. 213
Kim Bolleby, who is leading the men’s division of the European Bowling Tour 2019, was highest ranked for the 1th time in his career and it was indeed her first EBT Title.
Cherie Tan, who is leading the women’s division of the European Bowling Tour 2019, was highest ranked for the 2nd time in her career.
Click here to see the ranking in the Women’s Division
Click here to see the ranking in the Men’s Division
The ETBF Presidium has decided to include a new Article 8.5.8 into Chapter 8.5 of the ETBF Constitution, with the primary purpose to ensure higher degrees of specification for tournaments adopted in other series than the EBT, and additionally to ensure a timely correct publication of general rules for each edition of such series.
The changed article, which will be presented for the delegates in the ETBF Congress 2019 for ratification, is as follows:
Article 8.5.8: Tournaments adopted in other series than the EBT (New article)
- If a tournament is adopted in a series of tournaments, the name of the series, the period of the series (year or season), the number of the tournament in the series and the website of the series must appear in the application form.
- The source of the rules of the series must also be mentioned in the form.
- In case of specific restrictions, limitations or special requirements for individuals (athletes, coaches or officials) taking part in a tournament adopted in a series, they must be specified and defined in the format section of the form.
- The rules of the series must, for each edition of the series, be finalized in due time and published by the management of the series before the entry registration is opened for the first tournament in a season of the series.
The newest release of the ETBF Constitution is available at this site under the item Organization / Constitution. Its release number is 26.
It is a great pleasure to congratulating Italy for their first ever won gold medal at a World Championship and Ireland for their first ever won medal at a World Championship.
At the WMC 2018 in Hong Kong Marco Reviglio, Pierpaolo De Filippi, Nicola Pongolini, Erik Davolio, Antonino Fiorentino and Marco Parapini won the Team event by defeating the favourite team from USA 2-0 (189-169 and 210-166) in the best of 3 games Bakers format final.
Irelands Christopher Sloan bowled tremendous over the entire championships by qualifying to the Masters from position 6 in the All Event standing and finally came as far as the Semi Final, where he ended the most prestigious achievement in his career by winning a bronze medal.
We finally congratulate also Sweden with their bronze medal in the Trios event. The Swedish Trios consisted of Mattias Wetterberg Jesper Svensson and Martin Larsen.
The World Men Championships 2018 was conducted on 24 November – 6 December 2018 in the South China Athletic Association Bowling Centre in Hong Kong.
265 male athletes competed in Singles, Doubles, Trios, Team, All Event and Masters.
The 6 gold medals were awarded as follows:
Singles / Malaysia
Muhammad Ismail Rafiq
Doubles / Malaysia
Adrian Ang and Tun Al-Hakim
Trios / USA
EJ Tackett, Kyle Troup and Andrew Anderson
Team / Italy
Marco Reviglio, Pierpaolo De Filippi, Nicola Pongolini, Erik Davolio, Antonino Fiorentino and Marco Parapini
All Event / USA
EJ Tackett
Masters / Canada
Mitch Hupe
The Masters event was concluded as follows:
Semi Final: Mitch Hupe (Canada) vs. Dan MacLelland (Canada): 2-0 (199-176 and 224-221)
Semi Final: Kyle Troup (USA) vs. Christopher Sloan (Ireland): 2-0 (230-226 and 245-220)
Final: Mitch Hupe (Canada) vs. Kyle Troup (USA): 2-0 (192-192 and 202-190):
Click here to see the list of all medallists
Click here to see the completed list of results
As a consequence of technical issues, the centre in Riga (Latvia), where the EYC 2019 was planned to be held, is not going to be certified in due time.
As a further consequence, it has been necessary to move the championships to Plus Bowling in Vienna Austria, where it will be conducted in the period of 13-22 April 2019.
More information will soonest possible be published by the new organizer in Vienna.
The ETBF Presidium is grateful to the Österreichischer Sportkegel- und Bowlingverband, and to the management of Plus Bowling in Vienna, for their dedicated willingness to take the responsibility of the EYC 2019 at such a short notice.
The organizer of the Swedish based tournament “Lucky Larsen Masters” has decided to conduct the 2019 edition of their tournament without handicap for women.
It means that the tournament cannot keep its inclusion in the EBT 2019.
The ETBF Presidium regrets the decision, but we do of course respect that the organizer wants to develop the tournament in a different direction.
The tournament will, as any other international tournament, continued need approval from ETBF and World Bowling and thus being included in the Tournament Calendar at this site.
We want to thank the organizer for the two years they decided to include the Lucky Larsen Masters in the EBT and finally we want to mention, that we keep the door open, in case of a later wish to return the tournament to our tour.
Click here to see the EBT 2019 Calendar.
At a recently held meeting in the ETBF Presidium the rules for the EBT 2020 was decided. The rules are, with one exception, identical with the rules of the EBT 2019.
The ETBF Presidium has with a growing concern witnessed a negative influence from PBA on certain stops in the European Bowling Tour.
First of all PBA is requiring that ambitious organizers in Europe cannot keep a mandatory handicap for women and at the same time be able to award a PBA title to their winner. This is unfortunately damaging for the EBT, since it forces a few organizers to decide direction.
Lately PBA decided to conduct a part of their World Series in the period of one of the biggest tournaments in Europe, the Brunswick Euro Challenge, which has been conducted in their March period over the last 14 years in three different European countries. This is a very unfortunate and potentially damaging decision, first of all for the organizer in Munich, but indeed also for many athletes and for the EBT in general.
The ETBF Presidium has therefore; based on these incidents, decided that PBA and ETBF cannot operate in the same tour. As a consequence, an EBT Tournaments cannot, as of 2020, be included in any series organized by PBA or award a PBA title to their winner.
This new rule is for tournaments only. For the athletes, the situation is unchanged, since they continuously and with no limitations can compete in any tournament included in the EBT.
Since the beginning of the EBT in 2000, there has been a handicap for women in tournaments with a mixed division.
In the first 6 years of the tour (2000-2005) all tournaments with mixed divisions decided the size of the women’s handicap themselves, but all had a handicap. Later, as of the EBT 2006, the women’s handicap was by the EBT Rules standardized as 8 pins per game.
In the beginning of this year, a few tour stops had a female winner, where after a major “storm” started in various media and in social media as well. Numerous statements delivered were unfortunately seriously unfair to the women, who won the few stops.
No matter what, it seems that some at a moment had forgotten the purpose of the women’s handicap, namely that a women should win a tour stop from time to time. So the only thing which really happened was that the women’s handicap fulfilled one of its purposes.
In the last 8 stops of the EBT 2019, only male athletes have won tour stops, where after the debate, as numerous times before, calmed down for a period.
Over the entire history of the EBT, the average representation of women in tour stops with mixed divisions has been about 18%, while the average number of women winners of mixed divisions since day one is about 13%.
Only evaluating the last 5 years, the average is still about 18% women participation, while the average of women winners slightly increased to about 16%. The difference is identical to a women winner of 1-2 stops more in the last 5 years, which is a very small number to judge a statistical difference to be permanent. But even it is, it does not prove anything than the women’s handicap still is very valid and indeed needed.
Besides statistical numbers and percent’s, the introduction and the continued existence of the 8 pins handicap for women, is both a sports political statement and a very down-the-Earth practical tool ensuring an international competitive environment for women bowlers in a situation, where it does not seem to be possible to conduct tournaments with separated divisions.
The ETBF Presidium has at a recently held meeting decided that the women’s handicap will be kept as an integrated part of the European Bowling Tour, so far still with 8 pins per game.