Day four at the ORC World Championship off Tallinn: German World Championship crews neck and neck in two classes

The field in World Championship Group A is small but very fine and, from a German perspective, has so far offered a thrilling duel for victory: Tilmar Hansen's TP 52 "Outsider" with skipper Bo Teichmann and Michael Berghorn's Mills 45 Custom "Halbtrocken 4.5" have been sailing bow to bow for the crown in the largest yacht class since World Championship Day 1. While the "Halbtrocken 4.5" was still in the lead after the long distance at the start, the "Outsider" crew has since taken command with a one-point lead. The series of both teams has been more than impressive so far: The "Outsider" crew has already scored three times with 2, 1, 1, 4, 1 to win the day, while the "Halbtrocken 4.5" team did almost equally well with 1, 2, 2, 3, 2. Both teams have three races left to make the final push for the world championship crown.

While the Finnish "Mercedes-Benz EQ Power" defended its third place in Group A, another German-German duel for fourth place has developed behind it: Holger Streckenbach's TP 52 "Imagine" now has to fend off attacks from Jan Oplander's crew on the Swan 45 "Katima". The team was stuck in the doldrums for too long in the opening long-distance race and was only able to open the World Championship with a seventh place. Since then, however, the team has been stepping on the gas on the 2005 Swan with the construction number 47, which has been optimised for the World Championship, and after a total of five races is only one point behind "Imagine", and was able to shine with a second place on Thursday, even leaving the two leading German top yachts behind.

In the middle Group B, two well-known German boats are also fighting for the best starting position in the battle for a place on the World Championship podium: Jens Kuphal's modified Landmark 43 "Intermezzo" was able to work its way up to fourth place on Thursday with second and third place. The X-41 "Sportsfreund" with skipper Gordon Nickel was right behind in fifth place. After finishing sixth on Thursday, the Sportsfreunde managed to win the day. Ten points separate them from the Grand Soleil 44 P "Essentia44" with its Spanish crew skippered by Catalin Trandafir, which was already in the lead on day two. In second and third place on Thursday evening were two Estonian boats: a modified X-41 and a ClubSwan 42.

The fourth day of the Alexela ORC World Championship got off to a late start because the light sea breeze from the west was hesitant to set in. But the wait was worth it, as two up-and-down races were held in each of the A and B classes. In class C, the experienced race officer Eckardt Reinke even got three races through. This meant that the planned division of the 62 starters into gold and silver fleets could take place on Friday as planned. German boats are not competing in Division C.

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