She is “Mrs. Canoe Polo” in Germany: the sport had four World Games, Tony Lenz four times, and three times she won the title with the German team. There were victories at the World and European Championships, as well as national titles An impressive collection of titles that put the 32-year-old on a list of nominees for the likes of the Göttingen sports giants of the past decade.
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With her kindergarten friend Ina Bauer (now Pfeiffer), she not only did gymnastics at the MTV Grown, but she also got Lenz into canoe polo—and kept with it. That was in 2000, when she was just twelve years old. The player explains in a few words what made the game so appealing to her back: “We could have been out, the game was water, a team sport and we were four or five girls who won against boys at the time as well. “Exactly a year later, the student team became the German champions.
Göttingen Sports Legends of the Decade: Tony Lenzo
The girl from Göttingen had to learn a lot of new things to be successful: “I was one of the last girls to join and first I had to learn to move straight, because others were already zigzagging. I got high with the ball.” -Having also had to hit goals and find a position. She became a center and remains so to this day. “This position has a lot to do with experience and positional play, I’m a worker for others,” says Lenz , describing his work.
The Tjeblatt Looking for the Göttingen Sports Legends of the Decade
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The team from the Göttingen Paddler Club (GPC) stayed together until the women’s division, and the players won five national titles together. And because the coach of the student national team came from Göttingen at the time, invitations to the national team soon followed. Since 2006, when she was 17 years old, she was part of the German squad. This was followed by international performances, which were combined with interesting tours to Canada, Colombia, Taiwan, France, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Poland and Scandinavia. In addition to participating in the World Games, competition trips were to be financed by themselves.
Until 2011 she played for her hometown club based in KC, then moved to Hamburg to study after an internship at Lenz Göttinger Tgeblatt. “I knew the people there, there was a polo club, the city was not that far away and I wanted to go north anyway.” The 32-year-old has now lived in the Hanseatic city for ten years and worked there at the Hamburger Sportbund. After graduating, his position is divided into the areas of press work and administrative work for voluntary services. In canoe polo, he and his team had to work their way up from the third division to the Bundesliga from the Elster Canoe Club.
These athletes and teams are available for selection
player lady
- Neil Eckhart Noeck (German Triple Jump Champion)
- Hannah Buch (German champion in junior individual time trial)
- Jasmine Bothman (multiple world champion in mini golf)
- Tony Lenz (wins at the World Games with the national canoe polo team)
- Fiona Seiber (Winner German Masters/Chess)
- Angelina Wucherfennig (German Champion in the Air Rifle/Target Shooting Class)
- Birte Kressdorf (long-distance swimmer crossing the English Channel)
- Pauline Bremer (national football player, two-time Champions League winner)
- Jennifer Crowder (national basketball player and Bundesliga player and “Guard of the Year”)
- Barbara von Ende (multiple German senior tennis champion)
athlete
- Tobias Buck-Gramco (track cycling junior world champion with world record)
- Rolf Geese (world record in the decathlon in the M75 age group)
- Lars Bode (World Champion in the Dragon Boat Race)
- Ansgar Knauff (Professional at Bundesliga soccer club Borussia Dortmund)
- Aaron Donkor (linebacker for the Seattle Seahawks in der Nfl be Den)
- Florian Reichert (serial winner in the Göttingen Old Town Run)
- Robert Kulvik (winner of the EuroChallenge with BG Göttingen and the crowd favorite)
- Fynn Kunze (German year-old champion over 200m)
- Nils Nachelmann (German Para-Archery Champion)
- Lucas Richter (wins at the World Games with the national canoe polo team)
teams
- Tanzsportteam Göttingen (German champion and World Cup third standard formation)
- BG Göttingen (winner of the Basketball EuroChallenge)
- C-Juniors I. SC Göttingen 05 (regional football league, participation in the top division)
- Minigolfclub Göttingen Ladies (German team champion)
- RV Stahlross Obernfeld (Andre and Manuel Kopp, German cycling champions)
- Göttinger Paddler Club Ladies (German Champion)
- University of Göttingen women’s basketball (multiple German varsity champions)
- TV Jahn Duderstadt (3rd Handball Bundesliga)
- University of Göttingen 3×3 Basketball (Men’s World University League Final)
- Running University of Göttingen (Sabine Rothaug, Birte Friedrichs and Anke von Gaza: German university champions in Orienteering)
Now you can vote on the Internet gturl.de/sportlegenden
As a Bundesliga player, still active, he retired from the international stage in Portugal in 2019. “A lot of young people came, at some point it was time.” Lenz continues to follow the national team, as a fan she will go to the European Championship in Italy this year. In 2012, Lenz also made it to the list of nominees for Sportswoman of the Year in Lower Saxony, but there was a very strong competition between women’s Olympic and world champions.
During her active career, she was always just a gamer. “I’ve always loved getting in a boat,” she says. Everyone in the Bundesliga team has their own point of view, she says, pointing to a possible coaching position in the future. In fact, she wouldn’t rule out that “with a bit more distance from active play”. But he is still very close.
