Press Release:
The IRF Launches the 2004 Racketlon World Tour
Gothenburg, Sweden, 2004-07-24

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Revision history:
2003-12-11: First version
2004-03-25: The name of "Belgian Open" changed into "D'Hondt Open"
2004-07-04: Welsh Open removed from the tour due to cancellation (see newsitem)

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The International Racketlon Federation today makes official the Calendar for the 2004 IRF Racketlon World Tour. A cousin of Triathlon and Decathlon, Racketlon is the sport where players challenge each other in all four of the World's major racket sports table tennis, squash, badminton and tennis. Four sets to 21. The total number of points are summed up to decide the winner.

During 2003 the first IRF Racketlon World Tour took place, covering 7 tournaments in 5 different countries. In 2004 the Tour expands to 11 tournaments in 9 countries whereby, for example, the two known multi racket strongholds Germany and Belgium are added to the list. And, for the first time, Racketlon will cross the Atlantic through the arrival of Canadian Open in March. As in 2003 the tour will peak at the end of the year with the World Championships, this time in Vienna, Austria.

This is the full calendar:

• Swedish Open, Stockholm, 9-11 January
• Canadian Open, Toronto, 12-14 March
• British Open, London, 3-4 April
• Finnish Open, Lahti, 14-16 May
• D'Hondt Open, Oudenaarde (Belgium), 5-6 June
• Bulgarian Open, Sofia, 16-18 July
• Scottish Open, Monifieth, 7-8 August
• German Open, Weiterstadt, 27-29 August
• English Open, London, 9-10 October
• Gothenburg Open, Gothenburg (Sweden), 29-31 October
• The World Championships, Vienna, 11-14 November

The tour constitutes yet another in a series of increasingly ambitious efforts to find an answer to the question "Who is the Best Racketplayer in the World?" The question which splits the racketlon community in two camps is whether there is still anyone unknown out there that could challenge the World Champion Magnus Eliasson (Sweden) for this title. Sometimes described as "The Ivan Lendl of Racketlon" (see news article "Sweden's Racketlon Revenge" on www.racketlon.com) the former ice hockey professional dominated the 2003 tour almost completely and concluded a long series of nothing but victories in November by winning the World Championships for a second consecutive time. The tour is bound to find out if his superior at all exists. The group of people who believe that someone unknown will succeed in beating him is getting smaller by every new Eliasson victory.

However: Canadian former squash World Champion Jonathon Power is apparently also a good tennisplayer. Swedish former tennis World #1 Stefan Edberg has taken up squash and plays it at fairly high national level. There are also indications that former table tennis World #1 Jan-Ove Waldner (also from Sweden) might be interested to try Racketlon when his incredibly successful table tennis career comes to an end. He is said to play a strong game of Tennis and everyone who has seen him play tends to believe that he could do almost anything with any ball. These are only three of Eliasson's potential challengers.

If the reader of this press release is an excellent all-round racket player the IRF Racketlon World Tour constitutes an opportunity to find out if he even, in fact, is a top international racketlon player. But the tour events are not targeted on Elite players only. Most events will contain at least one separate class for amateurs and everyone who participates in any of the tour events will get a position on the IRF Racketlon World Ranking.

More information about Racketlon in general and the tournaments of the tour in particular can be found at www.racketlon.com, the home page of the IRF.

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