At the second Bundesliga regatta of the season off Kiel, 18 club teams and their fans celebrate their sport, the summer and the fun of the league. The battle for supremacy in club sport will take place on the inner fjord, close to the public. Jochen Schümann, Germany's most successful sailor in sporting history, will also be taking part. Jochen Schümann and his team start in the north for the Yacht Club Berlin-Grünau (YCBG). But one day before the end of the regatta, neither the co-favoured YCBG nor the two-time German champions from the Norddeutscher Regatta-Verein (NRV) are in the lead.
The leaders before the last five of a total of 15 races (flights) were initially the Seglerhaus am Wannsee (VSaW) club with helmsman Malte Kamrath, Tim Elsner, Jens Steinborn and Julian Bergemann with four daily victories, one second and three third places. In second and third place on the morning of the final day were Flensburger Segel-Club with helmsman Sven Koch and Chiemsee Yacht Club with skipper Leopold Fricke, who had made a strong start to the season. "Schümis" YCBG was in tenth place, the NRV with Sven Erik Horsch in twelfth place. YCBG sailor Oliver Freiheit set the motto for the final day: "Everything is still possible."
The narrow gaps between the clubs, the changing order after each round and the ambition of the teams show how much the league moves the clubs. Everyone has been training intensively for the third season during the winter. Coxswain Kai Niederfahrenhorst from the Munich Yacht Club, which has been in fifth place so far, summarised the impression of all the Bundesliga teams on Saturday after the races in ideal wind conditions: "It's amazing how it mixes." The second regatta ends on Sunday with the award ceremony, before the league action continues on 4 July off Warnemünde with the third league weekend, where the second division teams will also be challenged again in parallel to the Bundesliga.
Tatjana Pokorny
Sports reporter
