They originate from a women's team formed in 1977 under the umbrella of FC Rumeln-Kaldenhausen and have existed as an independent club since 8 June 2001.

The first team of FCR 2001 Duisburg, who carry the nickname of "Die Löwinnen" (lionesses), have played in the Bundesliga since gaining promotion in 1993.

In 2013 the club filed for insolvency and players joined and formed a new women's section at MSV Duisburg.

In the end they finished eighth in the Northern Group and were able to stay up while SV Bergisch Gladbach 09 and local Rumeln rivals KBC Duisburg, clubs both full of tradition, had to suffer demotion to the second tier.

Following the birth of her daughter, she no longer wanted to travel regularly between her hometown of Duisburg and her club TSV Siegen.

After a 2–2 draw in the first leg, Frankfurt won the return match by 5–1 and went on to win the Championship beating Grün-Weiß Brauweiler.

On the other hand, they were more successful in the DFB Cup where they reached the semi-finals for the first time but lost to the later winners FSV Frankfurt 2–0.

The first title achieved in the whole history of the club was gained on 3 February 1996 in Koblenz when, in the DFB-Hallenpokal FCR beat TSV Siegen 3–2.

Shortly after the beginning of extra time, Grings put her team in front but three minutes before the final whistle, Patricia Menge equalized.

With three goals, Inka Grings proved to be their most impressive player For the 1998–99 season, international Kerstin Stegemann came to Duisburg from FC Eintracht Rheine.

The success of the season was overshadowed by the death of their long-time executive director and main sponsor Jochen Zufall.

In order to make up for this loss, a support organization was set up for which the club was able to gradually gain many small-scale sponsors.

With financial aid from the City of Duisburg and North Rhine-Westphalia, the main club gained a piece of land specifically for their women's Bundesliga section.

On 8 June 2001, the women's football section split their ties to their mother club and declared themselves to be independent, taking the name FCR 2001 Duisburg.

By virtue of this re-founding, there were hopes of better opportunities in marketing, so as to keep up with the leading clubs in German women's football such as 1.

The club's regulations are based on those of male professional football, so in addition to the executive a board of directors was installed.

New players Silke Rottenberg and Linda Bresonik traveled with the German national team to participate in the World Cup in the US, which was indeed won by Deutschland.

In the summer of 2004 three new talents, Fatmire Bajramaj, Annike Krahn, and Simone Laudehr were signed, all of whom were to become class players and internationals.

Grings was with the German international team which became European champions in summer 2005 and won the title of top scorer with four goals.

After the close of the season, two top players left the club: Rottenberg (to Frankfurt) and Thompson (to Hamburger SV).

Surprisingly manager Obliers changed the goalkeeper for this shoot-out—replacing Kathrin Längert, Lena Hofeld now stood between the posts.

While the 'Frankfurterinnen' hit the back of the net at every attempt, Ursula Holl was able to save shots from Vanessa Martini and Patricia Hanebeck.

[4] Martina Voss took over the team, which had hit rock bottom through unnecessary loss of points, among them a 4–1 home defeat against Essen.

The club reached the semi-finals unbeaten where the Duisburgerinnen were able to spring a surprise by knocking out the French representative Olympique Lyon.

[6] With a 6–0 victory in the first leg of the final against Zvezda 2005 Perm from Russia, Martina Voss's team had already made the outcome a foregone conclusion.

[7] In the return leg, which was played out in the MSV-Arena, the game ended 1–1, so the "Löwinnen" became the third German team to win the European Cup.

FFC Turbine Potsdam, the Duisburgerinnen played a storm and won 7–0, the highest final victory of all time.

[11][12] In 2012 FCR Duisburg suffered a financial crisis and lost several leading players to rival clubs, including Alexandra Popp, Annike Krahn and Simone Laudehr.

[13] In January 2013 it narrowly avoided going bankrupt, but it managed to end the campaign and retain its position in the Bundesliga for the 2013–14 season.