Two of the best female bowlers in the world, Clara Juliana Guerrero from Colombia and 12-time Team USA member Lynda Barnes will compete in the 7th Columbia 300 Vienna Open from Sep. 29 - Oct. 4, 2009 at Plus Bowling in Vienna, Austria.

Guerrero (pictured left), 27, who won the 2005 World Ranking Masters, earned two gold medals at the Women's World Championships in Las Vegas last month when she finished atop the leaderboard in All Events (222.08 average for 24 games) and claimed the coveted Masters title.

Barnes (right), 41, wife of PBA super star Chris Barnes, is a former PWBA champion and has won two USBC Queens titles and the 2008 Clash of Champions in addition to her numerous medals in World and PABCON Championships.

Guerrero and Barnes, who are both coming from the the 2009 PABCON Championships in Puerto Rico, will face a strong field of more than 330 bowlers in Vienna.

Among the 60-plus women's field is defending Vienna Open champion Patricia Luoto (left), Germany, reigning European Bowling Tour ranking champion and current leader Nina Flack (right), Sweden, as well as 3-time EBT ranking champion and 2003 World Ranking Masters Britt Brøndsted and two-time EBT ranking champion and two-time EBT Masters champion Kamilla Kjeldsen, both from Denmark.

14 out of the top 17 in the current EBT rankings will be present in Vienna. Besides Flack (1st), Luoto (9th), Kjeldsen (11th) and Brøndsted (tied for 14th), No., 2 Nicole Sanders, Netherlands; No., 3 Mai Ginge Jensen, Denmark; No. 4 Nicki Ainge, England; No. 7 Diana Zavjalova, Latvia; No., 10 Ghislaine van der Tol, Netherlands; No., 12 Wendy Kok, Netherlands; No., 13 Priscilla Maaswinkel, Netherlands; No., 14 Anja Ginge Jensen, Denmark; No., 16 Rikke Holm Rasmussen, Denmark; and No., 17 Lisanne Breeschoten, Netherlands.

Other notables are Austrian national team members Ivonne Gross (left) and Patricia Klug as well as 3-time European Champions Cup winner Tanya Cuva (nee Petty) and World Youth Champion Tina Hulsch, who won the women's rankings in Vienna in the year 2007.

The 7th annual Columbia 300 Vienna Open is the 11th stop of the 2009 European Bowling Tour and one of the Tour's "Majors". The tournament will be held from Tuesday Sep. 29 through Sunday Oct. 4, 2009 at the renovated 32-lane Plus Bowling in Vienna, Austria.

The Vienna Open offers an increased total prize fund of 68.130 Euro - 57.900 € for Singles and 10.230 € for the Doubles event. The singles champion will receive the 6.000 € top prize while the doubles winners will split 1.600 €.

A 9-pin no-top tournament on Monday evening will kick off the five-day qualifying portion with free entries into the Vienna Open at stake. Players will be divided in four different average groups, but only players with less than 200 average are allowed to enter the no-tap tournament.

As every year since the inaugural Vienna Open in the year 2003, Bowlingdigital will cover the event live from Plus Bowling in Vienna with stories and results after each round commencing Monday Sept. 28 all the way through to the finals on Sunday Oct. 4.

In addition our colleagues from Zurich, Switzerland, Flavio Cuva (left) and Beat Grauwiler (right) will be on hand to support the Live Coverage with much-anticipated high definition videos and photos.

Click here to review Bowlingdigital's Live Coverage from the 2008 Columbia 300 Vienna Open or click here to go straight to the video section.

 

Tournament Format
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Prize Fund