Béla von Kehrling


Béla von Kehrling was a Hungarian tennis, table tennis, and football player but eventually a winter sportsman familiar with ice-hockey and occasionally competing in bobsleigh. He competed at the 1912 Summer Olympics and the 1924 Summer Olympics.
Just like Fred Perry, he played both tennis and table tennis professionally. In 1926 he played in the first table tennis World Championships final in London with Zoltán Mechlovits in doubles but lost to Roland Jacobi and Dániel Pécsi. He was also featured in the Hungarian team that won gold in team competition. Originally he wasn't part of the national team. While the Hungarians unanimously swept all of the medals after Roland Jacobi's singles and doubles success he suddenly been reported of the death of his father thus he decided to travel home. The substitute player was Béla von Kehrling who had to beat Munio Pillinger of Austria to have the team medal as well. He did so and completed the flawless victory for Hungary. In the end he took two medals in the table tennis world championships, one gold and one silver.
In 1924 he won the German Tennis Championships. The following year he was back in the finals but then lost against Otto Froitzheim. The same year he won Hungarian Tennis Championships. In July 1933 Von Kehrling won the doubles and mixed doubles title at the Dutch Championships.
Züricher Sport newspaper ranked Kehrling as No. 10 in the European Top 10 rankings in 1931.
In conjunction with his sports activity he was the vice-president of the Hungarian Tennis Association and the editor-in-chief of its official magazine the bimonthly Tennisz és Golf.

Personal life

Béla Kehrling married Magda Schlauch. She occasionally played tennis as well and wrote articles to the newspaper published by her husband. They had one son named Béla Kehrling, Jr, born in 1917 in Budapest who served as an Ensign in the cavalry brigade of the Hungarian Army in 1944. They had another son named Tamás who was born in 1924 and died in 1999.

Tennis career statistics

Notable singles wins

No.DateTournamentSurfaceOpponent in finalScore
1.1920KassaN/A Kamill FittlerN/A
1.1923Gotheborg GamesOutdoors Oscar Kreuzer4–6, 6–4, 6–7, 6–4, 6–2
2.1923MeranoN/A Otto Froitzheim11–9, 8–6, 6–0
3.1924HamburgN/A Louis Maria Heyden8–6, 6–1, 9–7
2.1925All England PlateGrass Roger George6–3, 6–4
4.1926MonacoClay Charles Kingsley6–4, 6–1, 6–3
5.1926NiceN/AN/AN/A
6.1926BeaulieuN/AN/AN/A
7.1926CannesN/A Charles Kingsley7–5, 3–6, 6–1, 6–3
8.1927Monacoclay Erik Wormwalkover
9.1931BudapestN/A Hyotare Sato6–3, 6–2, 5–7, 6–2
10.1931French Riviera ChampionshipsN/A George Lyttleton-Rogers7–5, 6–2, 6–4
11.1932BudapestN/A
12.1932San RemoN/A George Lyttleton-Rogers6–3, 6–3, 6–3

Runner-up

Table tennis career statistics

Ice hockey career statistics