Sailing World Championship: Kasüske coup: Berliner shakes up the Finn world elite
Tatjana Pokorny
· 03.08.2018
He took the first win of the day for the German Sailing Team at the World Championships in Aarhus: Phillip Kasüske had another good run on the last day of the Finn sailors' qualifying round. After the following twelfth place and a total of six races, the helmsman from the Seglerhaus am Wannsee club is ninth of the 90 Finn starters in the main round. This puts the 23-year-old Berliner on course to qualify for the 2020 Olympic Games.
In order to secure an Olympic Finn starting place for Germany at this early stage, Kasüske would have to be among the top eight nations in the final ranking. At the halfway point of the World Championship, only six nations were ahead of him for the Finn sailors due to two strong British and Dutch teams. "I'm very happy at this point. Winning the race is good motivation and helps my self-confidence," said Kasüske after the race in Aarhus harbour. When asked about his greatest strength as a sailor, Kasüske said after some thought: "I can stay focussed on the water for a long time." This helped him in the changeable and unpredictable conditions, especially on Saturday, as did his good fortune to have completed all six races so far in the blue group. The "blues" are always sent out onto the course ten minutes after the first yellow group and therefore have the opportunity to follow the developments on the course.
Philipp Buhl also defended his place in the leading group of 165 Laser sailors in seventh place overall after four races, but scolded himself when he pushed his boat onto the parking space in boat park 3 of the World Championship site. With 19th place in the third race, the Sonthofen-based sailor had caught the strike result in his fight for the World Championship crown that he would so gladly have avoided in the early stages. "That annoys me. I wanted to get through the preliminary round without a scratch," said the Allgäuer, who then sailed to third place and had by no means lost his fighting spirit. "Then I'll just have to sail like a world champion on the stadium course."
The second German win of the day went to the 470 sailors Nadine Böhm and Ann-Christin Goliaß, who were able to work their way up to 10th place after their less successful start and six races so far. One place behind the crew from the German Touring Yacht Club are Fabienne Oster and Anastasiya Winkel from the North German Regatta Club.
Strong comeback of the Volvo Ocean Race sailors in the 49erFX
Germany's successful skiff sailors had hoped for much more from their World Championship opener on Saturday. The initially challenged FX sailors Tina Lutz/Susann Beucke and Vicky Jurczok/Anika Lorenz are only in 34th and 43rd place after the first three short races in two groups. "We still don't have a clear answer to the reasons for this," said Vicky Jurczok directly after the races and before the debriefing.
The first races of the 49erFX sailors took centre stage on this day. The German top crews Lutz/Beucke and Jurczok/Lorenz did not get off to a good start
The international returnees from the Volvo Ocean Race caused quite a stir: Denmark's Jena Hansen (Team Vestas) and her foresailor Katja Salskov-Iversen lead the 49erFX classification after three races. The Brazilian Olympic champion Martine Grael is also back in the FX top group after her circumnavigation of the world with Team AkzoNobel, sailing to fifth place with Kahena Kunze on the first day of the world championship series. Mapfre sailor Tamara Echegoyen also seems to have been little affected by the long FX break: Although the Spaniard capsized in the second race, her second place showed that she is once again a force to be reckoned with.
The German 49er crews Erik Heil/Thomas Plößel (5, 16, 4) and Tim Fischer/Fabian Graf (10, 11, 1) will attack from 16th and 18th place on Sunday. Fischer/Graf achieved the third German victory of the day on Saturday. Helmsman Fischer said: "We got off to a good start in the series. We had good starts and also chose the sides well." The helmsman from Kiel is still struggling with the consequences of an ankle injury he sustained while sailing off Palma in the spring. As a result, his team was unable to train for two months.
