Since the turn of the millennium, the course record for the Pantaenius Rund Skagen race has belonged to the 67-foot Baltic "Uca". The crew of the former entrepreneur and employer president, who died in 2014, had the run of their lives in the 510-nautical mile long-distance classic in 2000. Almost perfect sailing conditions in the North Sea and Baltic Sea, the Skagerrak and the Kattegat, combined with a very strong sailing performance, created the ideal mix for the record 26 years ago, which challengers have been chasing every two years ever since. So far in vain.
"Parker" at Hanstholm robbed "Rafale" of its record chance
This was also the case this year, when Henri de Bokay's Elliot 52 "Rafale" from the Seglerhaus am Wannsee club started the Pantaenius Rund Skagen race as a record-breaking hopeful. Early forecasts had looked promising. But then an overly long period of calm in the Skagerrak off the west coast of Denmark near Hanstholm caused the team an early setback. By then, "Rafale" navigator Robin Zinkmann already knew that things would be more than tight.
Despite a fabulously fast second half, it was not enough for the crew on the Elliot 52 "Rafale" also in its second attempt after 2024 It was not quite possible to beat the 43 hours and 46 minutes in which "Uca" helmsman Walter Meier-Kothe and his crew completed the course in the 2000 Pantaenius Rund Skagen race. When the "Uca" record time expired that year, the "Rafale" crew already had Kiel Lighthouse in sight. In the end, however, with a sailed time of 44 hours, 8 minutes and 27 seconds, "Rafale" was a good one and a half hours (1 hour, 37 minutes, 33 seconds) short of the "Uca's" record, which could not be broken again.
Walter Meier-Kothe watched the current race from afar, as he had done all those years before. In the end, the 82-year-old "Mr Baltic", who grew up in Bremen and now lives in Hamburg, said of the "Rafale" performance: "Malte and the crew would have had a chance if it hadn't been for the parker at Hanstholm. After that, they were travelling very fast." The crew that brought "Rafale" home as first ship were owner Henri de Bokay, helmsman Malte Päsler, navigator Robin Zinkmann, Johannes Polgar, Klaas Höpcke, Marc-Daniel Mählmann, Philipp Sudbrack, Holger Lehnung, Ludger Gawlitta, Christian Rathgen, Lindsay Stead and Marco Schürmann.
Pantaenius Round Skagen Race: "Elida" and "Störtebeker" expected to finish next
Walter Meier-Kothe's review of the "Uca" performance more than a quarter of a century ago was sporty: "We were simply lucky with the wind, reaching top speeds of 26 knots in the North Sea at the time." However, when asked by YACHT, the helmsman also said with his characteristic wink: "We didn't make that many mistakes back then. That's why we had a small meeting with friends last year on Jörgi Heinritz's boat. Maybe we'll organise a little celebration now."
We also sailed two spinnakers from the mooring lines back then. But we still had one." Walter Meier-Kothe
After "Rafale", which crossed the finish line at 13:38:27, the next boats to finish in the afternoon were Daniel Baum's Tison 48 "Elida" and the Carkeek 47 "Störtebeker" with skipper Katrina Westphal are expected to cross the finish line off Kiel. The two boats still had just under 60 and just under 70 nautical miles to go when "Rafale" crossed the finish line.
IDM offshore decisions are made with the endurance classic
The battle for overall ORC victory in the Pantaenius Rund Skagen race also remained exciting. And also in the battle for the ORC podiums for the IDM-Offshore champion sailors and the participants in the North Sea Week. The double scoring of the long-distance results will decide the battle for the German Offshore Championship. Click here for the IDM interim results.
As the smaller boats performed strongly in the first two light-wind IDM races - Sundowner (rating factor: 1.25) and Capitell Cup Rund Helgoland (rating factor: 1.5) - it will be interesting to see how the results of the long-distance races affect the final ranking. But we will have to wait a while for that.
Tatjana Pokorny
Sports reporter
