Predator European Seniors Pool Championships
Organised by the European Pocket Billiard Federation
Gandia, Spain
27th October
GRAND SLAM FOR CORREIA & GOLDS FOR LYSHOLM & ULLMANN-HYBLER
PORTUGAL’S HENRIQUE CORREIA achieved an unprecedented clean sweep of all four individual 56-plus tournaments at the 2026 PREDATOR European Seniors Pool Championships as he swept aside Norway’s Bjorn-Erik Bergh to claim the 9-ball title in Gandia, Spain.
The Portuguese seniors GOAT had earlier cut a swathe through the straight pool, 10-ball, and 8-ball divisions and arrived at the venue this morning needing three wins to complete an historic monopoly. A fighting 8-7 win over Betrand De Loriel (France) in the last eight moved him into a semi-final match against Germany’s Reiner Wisbitzki.
It was another hard-fought 8-7 victory that put him up against Bergh, who had earlier defeated Belgium’s Johny Vanrijkel in his semi-final. The final itself was one-way traffic, though as Correia ran out an 8-0 victor to cement his place in EPBF European Championship history.
Commented Correia, “I really don’t know where I get my strength. I think it’s more psychological because I’m super-tired but when I’m on the table, and I’m sorry for the expression, I’m an animal and I want to eat it all. It’s my nature, I’ve always been like this and I hope I can be for some more years. When it was 7-7 (in the semi-final), I was positive because everything was going so good for me. And positive thoughts help to make things go good for you and that’s what happened!”
In the 46-plus division, it was Norway’s Roger Lysholm who came through to claim gold as he defeated home hope Diego Pedro Simon 8-6 in a tense final. Straight pool bronze medallist Lysholm had done superbly well in the semi-final as he dislodged Miguel Silva’s (Portugal) vice-like grip on the division.
The final started poorly for the Norwegian but sensing his opportunity, he dug himself out of an early two-rack deficit to lead 6-3, as he reeled off five racks on the spin. Although Simon came back at him, Lysholm, roared on by his teammates, was determined as he hung on for victory.
He said, “I’ve been chasing a European Championship since the late 80’s as a junior player and I finally got it. I’ve been close many times both on the Euro Tour and European Championships but never won it. I stayed strong and was patient. I got a couple of flukes in the beginning; I think I was 3-0 down at the start but I had a quick time-out and came back and did a job.”
Yvonne Ullmann-Hybler claimed her second European Seniors gold medal following on from success in 8-ball last year, as she defeated Sweden’s Louise Furberg 6-1 to life the 9-ball trophy. An earlier 10-ball bronze was a portent of things to come and she won six matches to complete the job.
She said, “I feel amazing and I’m very very proud of myself because from the beginning I struggled but every day it got better and yes, here it is!”
Ullmann-Hybler and Correia weren’t done though as they both went on to claim gold medals in their respective Teams events, which closed out the 9-day championships. In the men’s. Portugal defeated Spain and it was Correia who closed the match as he beat Diego Pedro Simon 7-5 at 10-ball.
This sparked wild scenes of celebration as teammate Manuel Pereira sprinted from his now-irrelevant match to leap on the table, wildly celebrating. Earlier, Miguel Silva had beaten Francisco Rafael Barcelo in the 8-ball match to put one hand on the trophy.
Germany beat Norway in the ladies’ final which went to a one-rack 10-ball decider after Christine Steinlage had beaten Ine Helvik 5-2 at 8-ball and then Mona Lundetrae defeated Yvonne Ullmann-Hybler in a hill-hill 9-ball match. With the prospect of running the table looking difficult under the tense conditions and huge watching crowd, the German pair ended things early via the three-foul rule to claim the title.
Starting on Thursday 29th October and running to Sunday 1st November is the final Predator Euro Tour event of the year – the Revora Spanish Open.
Streaming of Tables 1, 2 and 3 for the Predator Euro Tour can be found on YouTube, via the Pro Billiard TV channel - https://www.youtube.com/@ProBilliardTV
For all results, live scoring and draw, visit https://www.epbf.com/tournaments/eurotour/ and
https://www.epbf.com/tournaments/eurotour-women/
EPBF Sponsors
▸ Predator Group
▸ Iwan Simonis Billiard Cloth
▸ Aramith Billiard Balls
▸ Longoni Cues
▸ Kamui Brand