SailGP: Vettel's Team Germany attacks ahead of Dubai - more power with Neureuther tips
Tatjana Pokorny
· 07.12.2023
After entering the SailGP Super League in June of this year, the Germany SailGP Team is now set to take part in its sixth regatta on the weekend of 9 and 10 December. Helmsman Erik Heil and his team have been preparing for this since the beginning of the week in the warm, summery waters off Dubai. During an intensive training session lasting several hours in the middle of the week, the crew were able to compare themselves with the other teams and further improve their handling and manoeuvres.
Experience is not easy to make up for, but we are using every opportunity to move forward" (Erik Heil)
"Our development is good, the atmosphere in the team is cool, the learning curve is rising quickly and steeply," reports Erik Heil from Dubai. The team of the two-time Olympic 49er bronze medallist is fighting under the German flag to catch up with the top teams in the league, in which many are already in their third or even fourth season. "This experience is not easy to catch up on, but we are using every opportunity to advance," says Erik Heil.
At the initiative of German coach Lennart Briesenick, a very special training session was organised in Dubai this week, for which the teams were able to design their own brands. "We did 21 starts in just one day. That's more than we've ever done in all five regattas with five starts each. That was very good," says Erik Heil, who this year became the first German driver to compete in the Formula 1 of sailing for the racing team of Thomas Riedel and four-time Formula 1 world champion Sebastian Vettel.
Superstar Tom Slingsby on paternity leave, Jimmy Spithill takes over
The launches, manoeuvres, handling and, above all, communication on board the foiling F50 racing catamarans are extremely demanding. Those of the six-man crews who can draw on years of experience have an advantage. For example, the SailGP dominators from Australia. Tom Slingsby, two-time World Sailor of the Year, and his Green and Yellows have won the one million dollar prize three years in a row and are also among the favourites in the current fourth SailGP season. However, Maestro Slingsby will be missing in Dubai.
The jack-of-all-trades, Laser Olympic champion and Moth world champion from Down Under, who is putting his skills to the test in the 37th America's Cup with his American passport for the US team New York Yacht Club American, has become a father. The 39-year-old has taken a short break. He will be replaced at the helm for the Australia SailGP Team by none other than America's Cup winner Jimmy Spithill.
Spithill will be competing in the SailGP with Italy in the coming season
Jimmy Spithill had previously relinquished his role as CEO and helmsman of the American SailGP team in connection with the sale of the racing team. The newly formed US team will now be led in Dubai by Taylor Canfield, known as a match race specialist, in his debut as the driver of his own US team. Jimmy Spithill, on the other hand, has his sights set on founding a new Italian team for the next SailGP season.
"I have taken part in regattas in and for Italy many times in my career. The fans are the most passionate and loyal I have ever experienced," says Spithill. He continues: "I have no doubt that we will see great interest in the team and have great athletes on the team. I'm looking forward to announcing more details at the start of the year."
Can Team Germany attack the Swiss?
The new Italian team is expected to enter the SailGP directly after the Olympic Games and the 37th America's Cup off Barcelona in autumn. It is quite conceivable that the young shooting stars from Patrizio Bertelli's Azzurri team Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli - three-time Opti world champion Marco Gradoni and Nacra 17 Olympic champion Ruggero Tita - are already in the starting blocks for their next career leap in the SailGP. But before that, together with Spithill and Francesco Bruni, they want to make the seventh attempt by passionate Cup hunter Patrizio Bertelli a success.
But back to the SailGP next weekend in Dubai, which promises exciting races in the Dubai sailing area. The young Team Germany is still in tenth and last place in the SailGP season standings, but is already nibbling away at the Swiss team with Sebastian Schneiter at the helm, who are only three points ahead of them.
Improving performance with brain jogging
In order to get himself mentally and physically up to speed, Erik Heil has also recently been studying Felix Neureuther's guidebook "My training with Life Kinetics". The 2005 team ski world champion and son of skiing legends Rosi Mittermeier and Christian Neureuther promotes brain jogging through exercise - a way to improve the brain's performance.
His exercise programmes train visual perception, flexible body control and memory. A benefit for Erik Heil: "We have to communicate, decide and act extremely flexibly under pressure and in fractions of a second. This training makes a lot of sense. Put simply, it works like this: you start by standing on one leg. If you can do this with stamina, you catch a ball. Once you have this under control, clap your hands before catching the ball. This is how the exercises progress ..."
TV premiere with German commentators: Thomas Plößel and Tobias Schadewaldt on duty for wedotv
The two days of the regatta on 9 and 10 December will show how the latest preparations on the water and on land will affect the Germany SailGP Team's performance in Dubai. Along with driver Erik Heil, wing trimmer Stuart Bithell, flight controller James Wierzbowski and the rotating grinders Dan Morris, Jonathan Knottnerus-Meyer and Joseph Sullivan will be in action. In addition, the young German sailors Sophie Steinlein and Anna Barth alternate as strategists.
German SailGP fans can look forward to a special premiere: the wedotv television channel will not only be broadcasting the races live. For the first time, two German experts, Thomas Plößel and Tobias Schadewaldt, will also be on the programme. Erik Heil's long-standing successful 49er foresailor Thomas Plößel and Tobias Schadewaldt, 11th in the 2012 Olympics in the 49er and"Bundesliga-König" for the NRV, will commentate the races from the studio in Kiel for wedotv.
The SailGP is a fantastic opportunity for German sailing" (Tobias Schadewaldt"
Tobias Schadewaldt said before the TV premiere with two sailing German commentators: "I think the SailGP is super attractive to watch. On TV, it's currently the most exciting sailing there is to watch, because the America's Cup doesn't take place that often. The SailGP is a fantastic opportunity for German sailing. I wouldn't have thought it possible before the entry was announced. Of course I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the team. It's a huge task to survive where the best sailors in the world compete against each other."
The new SailGP trailer from wedotv:
Dynamic duo: Team co-owner Sebastian Vettel and driver Erik Heil show the differences and similarities between Formula 1 and SailGP:
The teams invite you to enjoy the regatta this weekend in the Dubai preview clip:
Tatjana Pokorny
Sports reporter
