He was at the head of the German Tennis Association during a golden era. Now Claus Stauder has died. The current head of the association has words of appreciation.
The former president of the German Tennis Association, Claus Stauder, has died. As the DTB announced, citing the family, Stauder died last Friday at the age of 86. He headed the DTB for 14 years from 1985 to 1999. This period saw Germany’s greatest successes with numerous Grand Slam titles for Boris Becker, Steffi Graf and Michael Stich.
In addition, there were three Davis Cup triumphs for the men and two in the Fed Cup for the women. During his time in office, Graf also won gold at the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, and four years later Becker and Stich followed suit with doubles success in Barcelona.
The great international successes of the top stars triggered a tennis boom in Germany over the years, and the DTB grew at times to more than 2.5 million members in over 10,000 clubs nationwide. Under Stauder’s direction, the tennis stadium at Hamburg’s Rothenbaum was fitted with a roof.
Stauder was the long-time managing director and shareholder of the family brewery of the same name in Essen. He was involved in tennis for decades. He had been a member of the DTB executive committee since 1975. After he declined to run for re-election in 1999, he became honorary president of the DTB.
The current association president, Dietloff von Arnim, praised Stauder in a statement as a great personality in tennis. He had created a monument for himself with his decades of work in the DTB. “With calm and prudence, he led the DTB through its most successful era. We will always be grateful to him for that,” said von Arnim.
2024-07-01 17:00:59
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