Jean Brechbühl (l) at the 1983 SU in Edmonton (CAN)
GENEVA – Today, June 18th, Jean Brechbühl, former FISU Technical Chair for Tennis (1959 -1991) and FISU Honorary Member since 1991 celebrates his 99th birthday in good health!
In 1943 Jean Brechbühl started working for the University of Geneva as the first sports director. 
The 99-year old Jean is still of good health
At that time the university students were already organizing activities but without any institutional structure. It was Jean’s task to start structuring the activities.
He studied economics at Geneva and sport in Zurich. In 1946 he set up the training of sport teachers in Geneva. He was also responsible for physical education for teachers.
The young Jean Brechbühl as a ski instructorOn the Swiss and international level, his skills in tennis led him to become the Technical Chair for Tennis for FISU. Already in the 50s, he was responsible for the tennis tournament in the world university games that became the Universiade.
In 1978, he retires with a single regret, not having seen the construction of a university sports center in Geneva.
During all these years, Jean Brechbühl collaborated with various top students and athletes, i.e. Geneva skier Renée Colliard, Olympic Slalom Champion in 1956 and Pharmacy student, tennis player Ion Tiriac, who became the coach of Ilie Nastase and Guillermo Vilas, to name a few.
(Source: Antonio Latella & Leonz Eder, FSSU)