Albert Schweizer was born in Villingen in January 1957. He was not born there, between Stuttgart and Lake Constance, into the sport of sailing. And yet, after his father bought a small inland keeler (L-boat) on Lake Constance, the sport of wind and waves gradually became a sporting and professional passion. The eldest son Albert was the most passionate about it, as was his brother Helmer, who was a year younger. The Black Forest family first came to Constance on Lake Constance when Albert was four years old. There they found their leisure home at the Constance Yacht Club.
Albert Schweizer: Training at the Konstanz Student Sailing Club
The boys learnt to sail at the Konstanz school sailing club. First in the Holzopti, then in Vauriens, Pirates and finally in the 470, they constantly expanded their sailing and regatta radius. In 1972, the father fell in love with a 6mR yacht called "Stromer", which he bought for the family. They took part in regattas at home and abroad with his sons and other fellow competitors. At some point, Albert was allowed to take the helm as a 16-year-old. He did remarkably well in the eyes of his father and crew.
The Swiss brothers' heroes on Lake Constance at the time were Albert Batzill and the brothers Jörg and Eckart Diesch. Batzill sailed to world championship titles in the Flying Dutchman. The Diesch brothers became Olympic champions in the FD in 1976. Albert Schweizer had just graduated from high school and started an apprenticeship as a sailmaker at North Sails on Lake Starnberg. His mentor was Eckart Wagner, who had inspired the young man from the Black Forest to follow this path.
The scion of a family of craftsmen, in which there were several photographers, he was enthusiastic about sailmaking, the manufacture of cloth and increasingly also its design. He was confronted with a lot of hard work during the week, but was able to combine his rapidly increasing knowledge with his favourite regatta sport at the weekends. Following his apprenticeship, Albert Schweizer accepted the offer to go to the North Sails parent company in San Diego as a trainee for nine months to gain more experience.
For Albert Schweizer, the Admiral's Cup was "the Wimbledon of sailing"
Because North Sails equipped many German Admiral's Cup yachts with sails, Albert Schweizer gradually grew into the German scene. First as a sailmaker, then increasingly as a sailor with sailmaking and design tasks on board. In the USA, he got to know people like North Sails founder Lowell North and other luminaries of the time, and stayed at the bosses' homes. The personal contacts he made back then stayed with him throughout his life.
Back in Germany, he immersed himself deeper and deeper into the cupper scene as an on-board sailmaker, working with legendary German cup hunters such as Hans-Otto Schümann, Udo Schütz, Willy Illbruck and design ace Rolf Vrolijk. Because he had a good command of sail design and could explain it even better, they gradually trusted him to do more. Decades later, Albert Schweizer still remembers these years with enthusiasm and a dash of nostalgia. golden cup times of German sailingin which he played an active role. The Admiral's Cup He often referred to the "Wimbledon of sailing" and was thrilled last year when it was restarted after a 22-year break.
When the Diesch brothers won their Olympic gold medal in 1976, Albert Schweizer experienced his first North Sea Week as a sailor that same year, because his North colleagues took him from the south to the North Sea. For him, the North Sea Week remained the "only real German offshore regatta" for the rest of his life. Characterised by many Admiral's Cup competitions since the 1970s, the red rock has been the venue for top-class regattas for decades.
From the south to the north: Swiss becomes "Bremer
Albert Schweizer had burnt it into his memory: "If you wanted to win the Cup, you had to go there." The first Admiral's Cup victory for a German team with the yachts "Saudade" (Albert Büll), "Carina III" (Dieter Mohnheim) and "Rubin IV" (Hans-Otto Schümann) in 1973 was always remembered by Albert Schweizer as a "dramatically positive turning point" in German sailing, which was followed by glorious times.
In 1987, Schweizer took part in the Admiral's Cup, which New Zealand won for the first time. Schweizer sailed on the one-tonner "Container" and, according to his own accounts, learnt about tidal sailing from the experienced current ace Stefan Lehnert from Bremen. Many years later, it was not only Bremen as a place of residence that connected the two men...
Albert Schweizer worked for North Sails on Lake Starnberg for a total of around two decades. Then he took the big geographical and professional leap: in 1995, his career took him to the north of Germany: In Bremen, the regatta sailor with a wealth of experience and successes in classes such as Laser, H-Boat, Flying Dutchman, Dragon, Starboat, Melges 24 and X99 took over the Beilken sailmaking company.
Hard low blow for the positive thinker
With a functioning business, skilled employees and good connections in the USA, the company was able to break new ground. After twelve years, however, the sailmaking business under Albert Schweizer's management had to file for insolvency. He himself pointed out that a "difficult situation with a major supplier from Great Britain" had caused the situation. His life's work, he regretted throughout his life, had been destroyed as a result.
But Albert Schweizer got up again. He got his career back on track in 2009 and since then has worked as an agent for Incidence Sails Northern Europe, looking after German-speaking customers in and outside Germany, Austria and Switzerland. The "people person" Schweizer enjoyed working for high-quality sailmaking. He also took part in North Sea Weeks. In forty years, he sailed 37 races.
Albert Schweizer celebrated sailing successes as helmsman and strategist on Claus Löwe's "Leu", which was built by Hans Stützle. They won the German championship title and finished fourth out of 66 boats off Kiel in 2014. In 2015, the 45-foot Vrolijk design "Leu" sailed to seventh place in the Fastnet Race in Group IRC 1 A. The navigator on "Leu" at the time was Boris Herrmann. Shortly after the turn of the millennium, he was one of the young sailors who inspired Albert Schweizer.
Boris Herrmann mourns the loss of his early patron Albert Schweizer
Boris Herrmann fondly remembers the support he received from Albert Schweizer along the way. Albert Schweizer became a companion and friend to Herrmann and Team Malizia over the decades. Boris Herrmann said of Albert Schweizer's death: "I have many memories of Albert. He made an important contribution to my development. He was my first sponsor with Beilken Quantum Sails at the Mini-Transat in 2001. Later, thanks to him, I was able to take part in a Fastnet race as a young navigator. We will all miss him very much."
Albert loved to spread good humour in the team. Germany is losing an authority in the sailing scene." Boris Herrmann
For around a decade and a half, Albert Schweizer also worked in an advisory capacity for the DSV Sailing Committee alongside Wolfgang Schäfer with great commitment to the sport. "Doc Schäfer" had brought him on board and now said: "I spoke to him intensively at the boot in Düsseldorf in January. I always valued his opinion highly because he was emotionally balanced and well informed. Albert always had an extremely supportive attitude towards German sailing."
How Albert Schweizer became race director of the North Sea Week
In 2017, Albert Schweizer took over from Stefan Lehnert, the North Sea Week Race Director who was once also brought into office by Albert Schweizer himself, who had worked in the North Sea Week team for 18 years and steered its sporting fortunes as Race Director for 17 years. He received the "proposal" in a cheerful manner at one of Stefan Lehnert's classic herring dinners in Bremen.
Albert Schweizer also peeked into the kitchen that evening. There, Stefan Lehnert and North Sea Week organisation manager Marcus Boehlich were chatting while stuffing herring onto their plates. They had long since chosen Albert Schweizer as their favourite candidate to succeed Lehnert. When Albert Schweizer enquired with interest as to who could be Lehnert's successor, they both grinned and pointed their fingers at him at the same time. Albert Schweizer asked for a week to think it over and then took on the task with both hands.
"As a sailor for decades the North Sea Week enjoyed it. I learnt and took a lot. Then Stefan came and said he wanted me to do it because he knew I could do it. It was about giving something back," said Albert Schweizer, who, like Lehnert, lived in Bremen, where he was also a member of the sailing club "Das Wappen von Bremen" and its sponsor ring, before taking up his position as the new North Sea Week Race Director in 2017.
In a double pass with Marcus Boehlich: good guidance for the North Sea Week
For the joint Energy performance for the North Sea Week and the good cooperation with Albert Schweizer in the team of around 50 volunteers, Marcus Boehlich said: "We had a very cordial relationship. We liked each other. We enjoyed organising regattas and training courses together and teaching other people. Albert spent a lot of time at my house, sometimes also at our family celebrations. We spent several years together, in good times and bad. I'm very happy about that. It was a good time."
A committed team player, Albert Schweizer steered the sport for almost a decade of the North Sea Weekalso conducted "100 years around Heligoland" last year and wrote another of his many important chapters in German sailing, which he will be remembered for much more as a giver than a taker. Albert Schweizer died on 2 April following a long illness. Many will miss him as a positive character.
Tatjana Pokorny
Sports reporter
