Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Menzner Crushes Travemunde J/22 German Open

J/22 one-design sailboats- sailing Travemunde, Germany (Travemunde, Germany)- The 124th Travemunde Woche was a perfect rehearsal for the big anniversary in 2014, when the Travemunde Woche celebrates its 125th year. This year's event had ten fantastic days of sailing with great weather and lots of sun. The newly installed SAP Sail Cube, which enabled the public to watch the sailing action "live on-line", was an enormous asset this year.  Plus, the newly built seating facilities, which were provided by the town of Lübeck, turned the beach promenade into a real sailing theatre.  Dierk Faust, the Chairman of Travemunde Woche for the Lübeck Yacht Club said,  “Whereas the wind conditions created a few difficulties for us here and there, the onshore entertainment was fantastic.”

Enjoying every minute of the onshore festivities and excellent race management offshore were the seventeen J/22s participating in the German Open, hosted by Lubeck YC's Travemunde Week team.  Taking top honors was Martin Menzner's German crew that included Frank Lichte and Christian Drews, their six 1sts in eight races was a blitzkrieg of the J/22 competition.  Second was Reiner Brockherhoff's French team of Christoph Declerque and Charles Micahux with 16 pts.  With five 2nds, Frank Lammerskitten's German team of Sven Harder and Martin Hinrichsen could've finished second overall were it not for their inconsistent three 5ths they had to account for in their overall scoreline, settling for third place instead.  The rest of the top five included Svend Hartog's German team (Dirk Fischer, Anne Westfehling, Stefanie Schweder) in fourth and Nico van der Kolk's Netherlands team (Stephan Peulen and Julius Jansen) finishing fifth.

Visitors on shore were provided with a fine festival covering 80 thousand square metres with everything that makes life enjoyable. “A total of 200 stand operators of all sizes and with varied and very different offers made the TW a very successful event in Travemünde. Practically everyone was represented from young to old. The Holsten Beach Area had wonderful programmes for older generations, especially the ensemble with the SAP Sail Cube and the Pilot Stage for near-shore race viewing. "The international cuisine on offer to all the spectators, such as “Pfaffenglück” or organic burgers, as well as Italian delicacies, were very well received,” said Uwe Bergman at the end of the event. “We didn’t reach the one million mark of visitors because of the sweltering heat during the second half-– many people preferred to say on the beach!”   Sailing photo credits- Bilder von Christian Beeck   For more Travemunde Woche J/22 sailing information