Baltic 500: Two-handed endurance test - "The enemy of all will be the cold"

The eighth edition of the Baltic 500 has started. At 10 o'clock on Father's Day morning, 48 boats and their double-handed crews set off on the 500 nautical mile course. Anyone who watched the start will not have immediately thought of XL challenges. The start in Strander Bucht was comparatively gentle and with much anticipation on board the very different boats.

Cold test for 96 athletes

What will make the eighth edition of the race, which has now become a classic, so special? "It will definitely be a cold test," says co-organiser Rasmus Töpsch, who once devised the Baltic 500 with Cord Hall and organises it with the team from Yacht Club Strande (YCS). Race director Cord Hall and his team sent the fleet into the race this year on a half-mile cross to equalise the field at the beginning.

The tracking for the 8th Baltic 500 can be found here.

Following the announcement of a number of well-known crews such as Mathias Müller von Blumencron with Boris Herrmann's co-skipper Cole Brauer on the J/V 43 "Red 2", there have also been last-minute changes to the fleet. At very short notice, Imoca sailor Andreas Baden has stepped in for the injured Sebastian Ropohl on his Class 40 "Cantaloop 40". Baden's Imoca classmate Szabolcs Weöres also joined the team.

The cold will be the biggest challenge." Mathias Müller von Blumencron

Andreas Baden reported: "I was allowed to take over a Class 40 without further ado because the skipper was cancelled due to injury. Szabi confirmed his participation on Monday morning. We got the boat on Tuesday. And now it's time to start. The biggest challenge for us will be to get the boat across the course in one piece. That should be doable. It should be a good race with a good wind. The routing says: 2 days, 12 hours."

Like Weöres, Baden is taking part in the Baltic 500 for the first time. The race will take the fleet via the Fehmarnbelt, up to Copenhagen, once around Anholt and then along Langeland back to Kiel. Baden, who is still promoting his own Imoca campaign, says: "I know the area well from other regattas. We are delighted to have such a beautiful ship. Of course I'm incredibly sorry for Sebastian. We are very motivated and will have some great racing days."

Three-way battle for line honours in the Baltic 500?

Arnt Bruhns, the former Whitbread circumnavigator and fellow racer of Wolf Scheder-Bieschin on his "Red 2" sister ship "Vineta", is now also known. The two racers have started as co-favourites for the line honours. However, the even longer Danish Shogun 50 "Fantastic 4" is also a strong contender for the fastest sailed time. Peter Bolvig and Jakob von Ohlen quickly took the lead at the start.

Oliver Schmidt-Rybandt and Clara Witthinrich on "Power Play" will be the benchmark in the field of six Dehler 30ODs. See also our preview. And that's how it went right after the start. Just behind them, Luca Meyer and Luca Leidholdt on "Play Harder" opened the Baltic 500 in second place in their division. The battle for the calculated ORC victory will be exciting. Decisions will probably only be made as the race progresses.

Jonas Hallberg's new, recently delivered JPK 10.50 "Hinden" is one of the co-favourites here. The skipper sails her in the Baltic 500 with Jonas Hiller. He was told that the JPK 10.50 only needs to be around one per cent faster than a Dehler 30OD according to the measurement certificate. The JPK 10.50 sailing for the host Yacht Club Strande will be hard to beat. On the other hand, Jonas and Jonas will be racing the new boat for the first time.

Crisp sailing pleasure and the enemy is the cold

"We actually have great sailing conditions ahead of us. We should stay in a system with winds from the south or south-west, sometimes at ten knots and sometimes up to 30 knots. The enemy for everyone will be the cold. At night it will drop to three to six degrees," said "Om" skipper Stefan Voss, who is taking part in the race with two-time circumnavigator and America's Cup participant Tim Kröger from the Norddeutscher Regatta Verein. Stefan Voss' Archambault 35 was built in 2008 and competes for the Lanballigau Yacht Club.

Their crew knows what Tim Kröger says: "The JPKs and others will escape us downwind, at the end of the day we could consolidate with a good downwind performance." Kröger also states: "It's anti-clockwise over the full distance. We'll sail towards Fehmarnsund and through the Öresund to Copenhagen. Then around Læsø and back through the Great Belt with probably quite a lot of wind on the nose as we head south again. And a lot of current against us..."

First comes the fun factor, then the wheat is separated from the chaff. The human factor will be a deciding factor on the tougher way back." Tim Kröger

How ambitiously the fleet opened the Baltic 500 could be seen at the start. Lay at the premiere in 2019 While there were still minutes between the differently ambitious starters, things were much closer on this Father's Day. "I think it's admirable that even two minis dared to enter the race," said race director Cord Hall shortly after the successful start without any early starters. However, the final judgement will only be made at the finish line, which most teams should reach between Saturday evening and Sunday.

A look back at last year's Baltic 500, when Melwin Fink and Lennart Burke set a new race record of 2 days, 6 hours, 7 minutes and 56 seconds: