Torbjörn Blomdahl (born 26 October 1962 in Gothenburg) is a Swedish professional

carom billiards Carom billiards, sometimes called carambole billiards, is the overarching title of a family of cue sports generally played on cloth-covered, billiard tables. In its simplest form, the object of the game is to score or "counts" by ' one's ...

(and to a lesser extent

pool Pool may refer to: Water pool * Swimming pool, usually an artificial structure containing a large body of water intended for swimming * Reflecting pool, a shallow pool designed to reflect a structure and its surroundings * Tide pool, a rocky pool ...

) player from

Helsingborg Helsingborg (, , , ) is a city A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edit ...

, Sweden who plays for

FC Porto Futebol Clube do Porto, MHIH, OM (), commonly known as FC Porto or simply Porto, is a Portuguese professional sports club based in Porto. It is best known for the professional football team playing in the Primeira Liga, the top flight of Por ...

. He is a seven time World Champion in three-cushion billiards, having won the

titles A title is one or more words used before or after a person's name, in certain contexts. It may signify either generation, an official position, or a professional or academic qualification. In some languages, titles may be inserted between the f ...

in 1987, 1988, 1991, 1992, 1997, 2015 and in 2019.

Background

Torbjörn Blomdahl was born in Gothenburg bu
at age 11
he moved to

. He is the son of

three-cushion Three-cushion billiards, also called three-cushion carom, is a form of carom billiards. The object of the game is to the off both while contacting the at least three times before contacting the second object ball. A point is scored for each su ...

player

Lennart Blomdahl Lennart or Lennarth is a Germanic variant of the name Leonard, most common in Scandinavia and German-speaking countries as a surname or masculine given name. Notable people with the name include: Surname * Camilla Lennarth (born 1988), Swedish g ...

, who was a driving force behind the local billiards club ''Borgen på Söder''. It was here Blomdahl learned to play three-cushion with his father as the teacher. His international breakthrough was at the European championships in

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

in 1984. Starting in 1989 he was ranked the best three-cushion player in the world. Blomdahl has been a resident of

Backnang Backnang (; swg, Bagene) is a town in Germany in the Bundesland of Baden-Württemberg, roughly northeast of Stuttgart. Its population has increased greatly over the past century, from 7,650 in 1900 to 35,761 in 2005. Backnang was ceded to W ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG),, is a country in Central Europe. It is the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany lies between the Baltic and North Sea to the north and the Alps to the sou ...

since 1994.

Cue sports career

Blomdahl has won a total of 7 world UMB

world titles, placing him second to only

Raymond Ceulemans Raymond, Ridder (title), Knight Ceulemans (born 12 July 1937) is a Belgian three-cushion billiards, billiards player who won 21 UMB three-cushion World Championship titles, more tha ...

who won 21. He is also the only Swede to ever be world champion. He's made 6 successful defenses, won 8 CEB European

titles which he defended successfully 4 times, and won 18 Swedish titles. His highest is 24 and once made 50 in 9 (5.555 Average ). Other tournaments Blomdahl won include the 2004 Carom Café International Tournament against Ramon Rodriguez and the first

Sang Lee International Open The Verhoeven Open is a three-cushion billiards tournament held in Flushing, Queens in the US state of New York. The event is sanctioned by the Union Mondiale de Billard and the United States Billiard Association. The event was known as Sang Le ...

by defeating Turkey's Semih Saygıner. In 2008 Blomdahl won the money-rich Agipi Masters tournament at the expense of

Dick Jaspers Dingeman Jacobus Johannes "Dick" Jaspers (pronounced yas-pers) (born 23 July 1965) is a Dutch professional carom billiards player who specializes in the three-cushion event. Early life Jaspers started playing billiards when he was three years ...

. Blomdahl has also excelled at pocket billiards, once defeating Korean pro Young Hwa-jeong and Filipino pro pool player

Efren Reyes Efren Manalang Reyes (born August 26, 1954), popularly known by the nickname "Bata" (English: "Kid"), is a Filipino professional pool player. Reyes is widely considered one of the greatest pool players of all time. A winner of over 100 int ...

in both

, nine ball, and

eight ball Eight-ball (also spelled 8-ball or eightball, and sometimes called solids and stripes, spots and stripes or rarely highs and lows) is a discipline of pool played on a billiard table with six pockets, cue sticks, and sixteen billiard balls ...

. He's also run 100 in

straight pool Straight pool, which is also called 14.1 continuous and 14.1 rack, is a cue sport in which two competing players attempt to as many billiard balls as possible without playing a . The game was the primary version of pool played in profession ...

References

External links

Great shots by Torbjörn Blomdahl

Torbjörn Blomdahl's High Run of 15 Points at 2007 Sang Lee International Open
1962 births Living people Swedish carom billiards players Swedish pool players World champions in three-cushion billiards World Cup champions in three-cushion billiards World Games silver medalists Competitors at the 2009 World Games Competitors at the 2005 World Games Sportspeople from Helsingborg 20th-century Swedish people 21st-century Swedish people {{pool-bio-stub