Flying Dutchman: World Championship gold for König/Brack - "That was always the dream"

With five top-three finishes in six world championship races, Kilian König and Johannes Brack were unbeatable at the Flying Dutchman World Championship in Santa María, Andalusia. The crew from the Hannoverscher Yacht-Club and the Segel-Club Edersee also took two day wins. Two-time FD world champions Kay-Uwe Lüdtke and Kai Schäfers narrowly missed out on the podium in fourth place.

Flying Dutchman: the golden World Cup course

With only ten points on their World Championship account, Kilian König and Johannes Brack relegated their fiercest rivals this time Szaboles Majthéni/Andrās Domokos (14 points) from Hungary and Nicola and Francesco Vespasiani (Italy, 18 points) to second and third place. 60 boats from eight nations made the summit meeting of a traditional German showpiece discipline in Andalusia a celebration.

The world championships were characterised by varied and sometimes extreme conditions. The light wind start was followed by stormy winds and a number of cancellations. "We always find it a bit difficult in light conditions, but that worked out really well with a close third, almost second place and the first win of the day," says helmsman Kilian König, looking back on the golden World Championship course."

And that also included an endurance test, as Kilian König reports: "Unfortunately there was too much wind afterwards, Levante. It came up over Morocco and Tarifa with winds of 45 knots in places. And that on the Atlantic..." After several days of waiting, the race committee decided to organise a strong wind race. "It got up to six Beaufort at the end," recalls the new world champion. The race began with 32, 33 knots of wind, which increased further as the race progressed.

Race victory with a broken harness

Sailmaker Kilian König explains: "Our harness broke at the end. Fortunately, we had such a big lead that we were able to win the race. But some people had to learn that you can capsize with a six-metre-long boat."

The crew "invested a lot" in their dream of winning the world title, as Kilian König explains. The new world champion FD, for whose hull shape and planning Karsten Keil (Planatech FD) and the Martin Herbst boatyard successfully worked on the construction, performed brilliantly with its own sails from König Sails in Waldeck. "The two of them accompanied us for nine months. We are very grateful to them."

Of course, boat armour is very important. But you also have to be mentally strong." Kilian König

"It was always a dream to win this world championship title. I can't believe we've managed it," says 43-year-old Kilian König, whose gold medallist is two years younger and works as commercial director at the hospital in Kassel outside of racing.

Friendship as a winning factor

The helmsman describes his crew's greatest strength as their friendly bond: "We've known each other as friends for so long. I'm more of an emotional type who acts out of my backside, Johannes is totally straightforward, knows pluses and minuses. They complement each other well, it's just great. We understand each other blindly." Here, the World Championship results show the result of the solidarity within the crew.

German crews have played a leading role in the Flying Dutchman World Championships from the very beginning - in both Olympic and non-Olympic times. Rolf Mulka and Ingo von Bredow won the first two World Championships in 1956 and 1957, first on Lake Starnberg and then off Rimini. Ilja Wolf and Bernd Klenke won in 1974 in the later Olympic venue of Weymouth.

In 1978, the FD World Championship podium was occupied by the two top German crews of their time: Albert and Rudolf Batzill won gold. Jörg and Eckart Diesch won World Championship silver two years after their Olympic victory, but were not to win gold at a World Championship until later. Other German FD world champions were the Bazills again in 1981, Anton Schwarz and Peter Fröschl a year later and Albert Batzill again in 1984 - this time with Klaus Wende.

König/Brack win 13th world championship title for GER crews

In 1986, the Diesch long-time favourites Jörg and Eckart finally won their world championship gold in the FD. In 1989, Albert Batzill won his fourth world championship gold with his third co-skipper Peter Lang. In the post-Olympic era of the Flying Dutchman, Ulf Lehmann and Stefan Mädicke won the World Championships in Hungary in 1996. 26 years later, Kay-Uwe Lüdtke and Kai Schäfers won in 2022 and again two years later. Now the 13th German World Championship title has gone to Kilian König and Johannes Brack.

In 1960, the Flying Dutchman replaced the Sharpie in the Olympic programme for the first time and remained part of the Olympic sailing programme until the 1992 Games in Barcelona. In addition to the Diesch brothers, Ulli Libor and Peter Naumann added their names to the list of German Flying Dutchman medallists at the Olympic Games, winning silver in 1968 and bronze in 1972.

The end of the Olympic era by no means marked the end of the class, which continued to perform well afterwards. Kilian König and Johannes Brack have proven this once again under the German flag. If you add to this the performance of two-time world champions Kay-Uwe Lüdtke and Kai Schäfers (YCBG/HYC), then German sailors remain an outstandingly strong force in the Flying Dutchman.

There was a threat of an FD slump after the Olympic Games, but the class remained strong and extremely lively. A report by YACHT TV showed this eight years ago at the World Championships in Steinhude: