Petrissa Solja (born 11 March 1994) is a German

table tennis Table tennis, also known as ping-pong and whiff-whaff, is a sport in which two or four players hit a lightweight ball, also known as the ping-pong ball, back and forth across a table using small solid rackets. It takes place on a hard table div ...

player. Solja won silver in the team event in the

2016 Summer Olympics The 2016 Summer Olympics ( pt, Jogos Olímpicos de Verão de 2016), officially the Games of the XXXI Olympiad ( pt, Jogos da XXXI Olimpíada) and also known as Rio 2016, was an international multi-sport event held from 5 to 21 August 20 ...

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...

. She reached her highest world ranking of thirteenth in March 2016.

Personal life

Solja was born in

Kandel Kandel () is a town in the Germersheim district of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, near the border with France and approximately 18 km north-west of Karlsruhe, and 15 km south-east of Landau. Kandel is twinned with the small Lancashir ...

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; german: link=no, Rheinland-Pfalz ; lb, Rheinland-Pfalz ; pfl, Rhoilond-Palz) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the ...

, Germany, into a table tennis-playing family; her mother, Dagmar Solja-Andruszko, played table tennis for ATSV Saarbrücken. Petrissa's two older sisters also play table tennis; her sister Amelie competed for Austria in the

2012 Summer Olympics The 2012 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012) was an international multi-sport event held from 27 July to 12 August 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. The first event, the ...

in London (qualifying for Austrian citizenship due to the Solja sisters' grandmother being from Austria). Before the

, Solja posed together with swimmer

Isabelle Härle Isabelle Härle (born 10 January 1988) is a German swimmer. Since 2011, she participates in the open water events. She won the bronze medal at the Team 5 km world championships. At the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, she competed in th ...

, rower Julia Lier, cyclist Nadja Pries and injured pole vaulter Katharina Bauer for the German edition of

Playboy ''Playboy'' is an American men's lifestyle and entertainment magazine, formerly in print and currently online. It was founded in Chicago in 1953, by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. K ...

Table tennis career

Solja is coached by her father, Pavel, and plays left-handed with a

shakehand grip Table tennis is unique among racket sports in that it supports a wide variety of playing styles and methods of gripping the racket, at even the highest levels of play. This article describes some of the most common table tennis grips and playing s ...

. As a junior player, Solja had considerable success. She won the Cadet singles events at the 2008 and 2009 European Youth Championships, beating

Bernadette Szőcs Bernadette Cynthia Szőcs ( hu, Szőcs Bernadette Cynthia; born 5 March 1995) is a professional table tennis player from Romania who is currently at a career World Table Tennis (ITTF) high ranking of No. 11. Career In September 2011, she trave ...

and Yana Noskova in the two finals, respectively. Although she lost twice in the Junior singles finals to Bernadette Szőcs in 2011 and 2012, she was the most successful European player at the World Junior Championships in 2012, reaching the semi-finals of the girls' singles, and overall winning three bronze medals. Solja was German young player of the year in 2012. With Sabine Winter, she won the German national doubles championship in 2013 and 2014. At the

, Solja won a silver medal in the women's team competition after being beaten, alongside partner

Han Ying Han Ying (born 29 April 1983 as ) is a female table tennis player representing Germany since 2010. A specialist in defensive chopping, a style in decline ever since the mid-1990s, she is one of a few surviving defensive players active at the ITTF ...

, by the Chinese team by 0 to 3. This result was the best by a European team in the women's team competition at the Olympics, and exceeded expectations given the team's third

seed A seed is an embryonic plant enclosed in a protective outer covering, along with a food reserve. The formation of the seed is a part of the process of reproduction in seed plants, the spermatophytes, including the gymnosperm and angiospe ...

position. Solja lost in the third round of the women's singles to

Ri Myong-sun Ri Myong-sun (; born 26 January 1992) is a North Korean table tennis Table tennis, also known as ping-pong and whiff-whaff, is a sport in which two or four players hit a lightweight ball, also known as the ping-pong ball, back and forth ac ...

of North Korea. In 2017, Solja, alongside partner

Fang Bo Fang Bo (; born November 6, 1992) is a Chinese male table tennis player. In 2002, Fang Bo became a member of the Shandong Luneng table tennis club. In 2009, he joined the China national table tennis first team. In the same year December 2009, h ...

, won bronze in the mixed doubles at the

World Championships A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

in Düsseldorf, Germany. This was the first World Championship medal in mixed doubles for Germany since 1971. Later in 2017, Solja competed in the inaugural Ultimate Table Tennis League in India. Solja played for German club TTC Berlin Eastside from 2014, before taking a break from table tennis at the end of 2017, and signing for TSV Langstadt in 2018. In 2019, Solja came back from 3 games down to win gold in the ITTF-Europe Top 16 against

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Solja, Petrissa Living people 1994 births German female table tennis players Olympic table tennis players of Germany People from Germersheim (district) Table tennis players at the 2016 Summer Olympics Table tennis players at the 2020 Summer Olympics 2010s Playboy Playmates Olympic medalists in table tennis Olympic silver medalists for Germany Medalists at the 2016 Summer Olympics World Table Tennis Championships medalists Table tennis players at the 2015 European Games Table tennis players at the 2019 European Games European Games medalists in table tennis European Games gold medalists for Germany Sportspeople from Rhineland-Palatinate