Kite World Championships in Kühlungsborn: Klaus Diederichs steers his kite "Fever" to World Championship victory

After all, 51 "fiery" kite crews had hungrily gathered under flags from 13 countries for the World Championship off Kühlungsborn, which was originally scheduled to take place a year ago. Klaus Diederich's "Fever" won the race for the world championship crown. The investment banker steered the boat himself and, with star boat world champion Diego Negri and Jamie Lea in the boat, won with aplomb after ten races. With one strike (21st), the successful trio with the likeable "gentleman sailor" Diederichs at the tiller achieved two daily victories, the second of which came in the tenth and final race at the ideal time. With their consistently good series, Diederichs and his team relegated Andy Beadsworth's British team and Wolf Waschkuhn's Swiss team to second and third place. Ingo Ehrlicher, Malte Philipp and Michael Lipp, who regularly feature in the top five, sailed to fourth place. They were satisfied with their performance. Malte Philipp said: "We get about 25 sailing days a year among the crazy people here, some of whom put in more effort than any Olympic sailor. That's why we were really pleased with our performance." Australian America's Cup veteran and former match race giant Peter Gilmour, Yasuhiro Yaji and his son Sam Gilmour finished sixth in the strong field. Click here for the overall results (please click!).

The beautiful sailing area, the new Kühlungsborn marina and the organising Kühlungsborn Sailing Club offered the 153 participants and the organisers a charming and challenging temporary home. Peter Gilmour from Down Under, who knows all the tricks of the trade, enthused: "It's like being in Fremantle, Australia." The club in particular went to great lengths with the programme and service for the World Championship participants. Race director Nino Smueli and his team were able to compensate for one day of calm with three races the following day. In addition to thrilling races and exciting sport, there was also plenty to discuss on land.

The case of British helmsman Andy Beadsworth in the Dragon class had already been the subject of intense discussion before the World Championships. Beadsworth had been disqualified from races 2, 3 and 4 at the European Championships in Sanremo, Italy, for technical reasons. At 1.5 centimetres, his mast foot clearance had exceeded the prescribed maximum of five millimetres all too clearly. " However, there was no investigation into the case with regard to possible gross unsportsmanlike behaviour in Italy, although it could have been initiated by other participants in the form of a report to the jury. Beadsworth had quickly craned his boat out of the water after the clear jury decision at the European Championships in April and did not live to see the end of the regatta.

At the World Championships, Beadsworth was once again one of the co-favourites. Once again, discussions were sparked by incidents in which he was involved. For example, a crash with Jan Woortman's team in the final race, the rear of which was damaged in the process. According to the official jury protocol, the protest was rejected due to Woortman's late protest on the water. The wording of the reasoning: "GER 1212 (ed.: Woortman) failed to raise and visibly display the red flag at the first reasonable opportunity as required by RRS 61.1 (a)." Regarding the facts underlying the jury's finding and judgement, the jury noted the following in protest case 9: "GER 1221 shouted 'protest' and displayed a red flag 30 seconds after the incident (own statement and noted on the protest form)." The two-part statement indicates that the protest was probably made immediately, but the red flag was only shown a little later in the middle of the hectic start phase. The fact that Beadsworth had obviously disregarded the right of way rules nevertheless stuck. According to one participant, this was also shown by the fact that Wortmann's stern and not the side of the kite had been damaged and therefore there could not have been an overlap. An indication from jury circles to Beadsworth that it was probably right to pay for Wortmann's damage also spoke in favour of this.

In the final, Beadsworth was unintentionally noticed once again after the crash, as he had been identified as an early starter with his sail number TUR 1212 at the start of race 10 under a "black flag". However, in World Championship protest case number 7 submitted by Beadsworth, the jury ruled that Beadsworth's kite was not an early starter in this final race, had "not been in the triangle formed by the start line and the first mark" and granted redress in the form of the average score of the placings achieved in World Championship races one to nine. The reason given by the jury was that the race committee had mixed up the numbers when transmitting the early starters. The race officer responsible admitted the mix-up at the hearing and apologised. According to the jury, the error "significantly worsened the result of TUR 1212 in race no. 10 through an unauthorised action by the race committee through no fault of its own". For many participants, the decisions on the final day were difficult to understand. Malte Philipp was not the only one to say: "The jury's decisions on the last day of racing were difficult to understand." The fourth-placed team with helmsman Ingo Ehrlicher, Malte Philipp and Michael Lipp were named the "Winners of Hearts" in the organisers' final World Championship announcement. Philipp Ocker, Florian Grosser and Oliver Davies won the Corinthean World Championship classification ahead of the crew of Christoph Skolaut (Austria) and the Dutch Bakker team.