The WTA Berlin (officially since 2020: bett1open ) is a grass tennis tournament of the WTA Tour , which was held on clay as the International German Championships in Berlin from 1979 to 2008 and is to be played on grass from 2020. Before 1979, the German Open for women and men were held in Hamburg.
The women's tournament has been held in Berlin since 1979. At the beginning of the 1980s, Bettina Bunge and Claudia Kohde-Kilsch, two Germans, were able to enter the winners' lists. From 1986 another German dominated the tournament with Steffi Graf . She won the tournament nine times within eleven years, making her the event's record winner.
Similar to the men's tournament in Hamburg , the women's tournament also experienced an enormous upswing and was one of the most important competitions after the Grand Slam tournaments . The LTTC Rot-Weiß Berlin facility on Hundekehlesee was therefore expanded in the mid-1990s. The Steffi Graf Stadium has held up to 7,000 spectators since 1996. Its capacity can be adapted to requirements with the help of mechanically extendable grandstand parts.
After Steffi Graf's resignation, interest in this tournament fell sharply from 1999 onwards among visitors and television companies, which led to major financial problems for the German Tennis Association (DTB). After running the tournament in deficit for several years, he sold the rights to the event in 2004 to the Qatar Tennis Federation . The tournament continued to operate as the "German Championship", but was no longer organized by the German association.
The name of the tournament changed several times from 1997 onwards due to non-fulfilled sponsor expectations. From 1997 to 2002 the tournament was called the EuroCard Ladies German Open , 2003 Mastercard German Open , 2004 Ladies German Open , 2005 Qatar TOTAL German Open and 2006 Qatar Telecom German Open .
The event took place for the last time in 2008. The Qatari consortium sold the rights back to the WTA, but left € 800,000 in debt. It was initially not known whether the tournament would take place again. In 2009 the WTA Warsaw followed , 2011–2013 the WTA Brussels .
Official name of the tournament:
1971–1979: German Open
1981–1988: German Open
1989–1990: Lufthansa Cup
1991–1992: Lufthansa Cup German Open
1993-2000: German Open
2001–2002: Eurocard German Open
2003: MasterCard German Open
2004: Ladies German Open
2005: Qatar Total German Open
2006–2008: Qatar Telecom German Open
2020– : bed1open0000
On September 18, 2019, the Emotion Sports agency confirmed that the WTA lawn tournament Bett1 Open will take place on the grounds of the LTTC Rot-Weiß from 2020 . The facility will be modernized and there will be two more grass pitches in addition to the Center Court. In addition, there will be three places in the Olympic Park. The event is a preparation for the Wimbledon Championships and should take place for the first time from June 15 to 21.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic , the new edition of the tournament planned for 2020 has been canceled. Overall, the WTA and the ATP have suspended the lawn season for June 2020. The 2021 tournament is scheduled to take place from June 12th to 20th.
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