Olympic revival suffers from weak wind

Big effort, little return: sailors and race committee struggled for usable results on the second day of the revival of the 1972 Olympic sailing regattas. At around 12 noon, race officers Fabian Bach (Tempest) and Robert Niemczewski (Dragon) sent their fleets onto the course. They gave everything, tried to start several times. What remained in the evening, however, was only one race for the Tempest, who thus have two races in the list for their World Championship ranking. At the top there was a change. Hannes Brochier/Peter Kern are now leading ahead of the opening winners Lars and Leif Bähr.

At the jetty there was a mooring beer and „Hells Bells“ by AC/DC, on the water before only a lukewarm breeze. The Dragons struggled on the outer course for a long time, but in the end in vain. „We tried three attempts, in the third I let them go. But the wind shifted and pumped too much, so I had to abort after a few minutes,“ explained race director Robert Niemczewski. Martin Görge had to pause for a moment when asked if the decision was right, but said: „The wind was difficult, but the decision was okay. For us, though, it was unfortunate. It was just looking so good when it was called off. We were tacking on the layline, had the whole field in the window and would have certainly arrived in a top position at the first buoy,“ said the Kieler, who would have liked to sail at least a few short test races regardless of official races to make good use of the hours on the water.

The Dragon sailors cannot expect to be spared on the next two days. Since they will only sail until Saturday, race director Niemczewski plans to bring forward the run-out time to start three races each.