With three day wins in a row, the Berlin 49erFX sailors Vicky Jurczok and Anika Lorenz not only dominated the Brazilian Olympic champions Martine Soffiatti Grael and Kahena Kunze at the World Cup regatta off Hyères on Thursday, but also their entire fleet. Vicky "Püppi" Jurczok said with a smile: "We got off to a very good start. And we were very fast. If we were always as fast as we were today, we would make our lives a lot easier." Thanks to their masterful performance, the Olympic athletes are in second place after nine races, behind Grael/Kunze and ahead of Great Britain's Charlotte Dobson and Saskia Tidey. After winning the Trofeo Princesa Sofía, the German women's duo is once again in impressive form. And they are also flying the flag for the German Sailing Team, which was able to achieve some top results in the other classes on the third day of the second World Cup regatta of the year, but also had to cope with setbacks.
First and foremost active speaker Philipp Buhl, who struggled with the light to medium, strong winds in France. His coach Alex Schlonski also saw: "Philipp's starts weren't quite ideal today. He perhaps took a little too little risk. It wasn't a great day for him. On the plus side, he has very good speed. He is very fast. There will be good wind tomorrow. There's still room for improvement. It's supposed to be really peppery here. We're expecting winds somewhere between 27 and 40 knots. We hope we can sail..." If so, Buhl will be delighted. The 49er bronze medallist Erik Heil (49er) said of him in Rio: "If the Games had taken place off Hyères in decent winds, Philipp would have won gold." However, after finishing 17th, 24th and 27th, Buhl initially dropped back to 16th place in the World Cup regatta and will have to fight in the remaining four races if he still wants to reach the medal race. "I'm actually in a good mood, I just need to link the good things together better here and there," said the Sonthofen native self-critically.
Erik Heil and Thomas Plößel are getting back on track after a weak start to their return to Olympic 49er sailing. After nine races, the Olympic bronze medallists moved up from the unaccustomed depths of the rankings to 14th place. Directly behind the Berliners are Tim Fischer and Fabian Graf, who had made such a strong start to the World Cup, but fell out of the top ten on Thursday with an early start and 13th and 31st place respectively.
Laser Radial helmswoman Pauline Liebig made a big leap towards the top, coming eleventh in the well-staffed field with 7th and 2nd place. Malte Winkel and Matti Cypra are in tenth place in the men's 470. The World Cup regatta ends for some disciplines with the medal races on Saturday, for the others on Sunday.
To the results with all German participants here.
Tatjana Pokorny
Sports reporter
