Former S. L. Green Champ Anders Wahlstedt Wins Swedish National 45-And-Over Laurels
by Rob Dinerman, for DailySquashReport.com
Dateline March 28th, 2012 --- Anders Wahlstedt, the former hardball, softball and doubles star of the 1990’s and early 2000’s, journeyed to his native Sweden and won the 45-and-over portion of the age-group Swedish Nationals, held this past weekend at the Royal Lawn & Tennis Club in Stockholm. Wahlstedt, who earned his way into the top-five of the WPSA hardball rankings (defeating Mark Talbott and Marcos Mendez en route to the final of the ’96 Greenwich Open), captured the S. L. Green Championship in 1994 (the year before it became a “Closed” event in which only U. S. citizens could participate) and teamed with Scott Stoneburgh to win the 1996 North American Open Doubles and the 2001 U. S. Pro Doubles, won all three of his matches without losing a game.
Wahlstedt, a two-time winner (in 1988 and 1993) of the Open division of the Swedish Nationals, represented Sweden in the World Team Championships four times, namely Egypt ’85, London ’87, Singapore ’89 and Helsinki ’91 and also played on the ’95 U. S. squad when the event was again held in Egypt. Two of his former Swedish teammates, Fredrik Johnsson and Bjorn Almstrom, also played on Sunday in the finals of their respective age-group events, with Christian Borgvall out-playing Johnsson in the 35’s flight and Johan Westerholm recording his first-ever win over Almstrom in the 50’s. Christian Drakenberg, who has won the Open event several times in recent years, emerged victorious in his 35’s final against David Mcalpine, and in the finals of the upper age groups, Jan Zimdahl defeated Tomas Carlsten in the 55’s, Olle Beneus rose superior to Roger Ostberg in the 60’s and Ulf Carlsson out-lasted Pelle Hagerman in the 65’s. The host venue has a storied history, having been the scene for many years of the Swedish Open in tennis, where John McEnroe, Bjorn Borg (a huge crowd favorite there, as one can imagine) and the other top players of that 1980’s generation contested some of the most exciting matches of their era.
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