This year, the members of the Academic Sailing Club in Munich (ASViM) are celebrating 125 years of their history. The German Sailing Association (DSV) is marking the anniversary with a profile on its website. You can also read it below here on YACHT online, courtesy of the DSV:
Sailing brings people together
The has been in existence for 125 years Academic Sailing Club in Munich. Supporting one another in sailing, in studies, in work and in life – that remains the focus of the community on Bavaria’s Lake Ammersee to this day. The German Sailing Association offers its congratulations on this special anniversary.
How it all began...
Promoting student sailing and a spirit of mutual support
The Berliners took the lead with their Academic Sailing Club in 1886, and the Munich students followed suit in 1901: 125 years ago, on 23 October 1901 to be precise, students and engineers from the Technical University founded the Academic Sailing Club in Munich (ASViM). Even back then, the club’s focus was on promoting student sailing and fostering a spirit of mutual support. By the end of March 1902, the members had launched the club’s yacht, the ‘Wiking’, at the Ammersee Shipping Company’s shipyard, and the ASViM’s first sailing season was able to begin. The “Royal Technical University” recognised the club as a registered association, and it was admitted to the German Sailing Association.
In 1903, the first ASViM members took part in regattas; the following year, the artist and keen sailor Ludwig Scheuermann donated a plot of land in Herrsching, on the eastern shore of Lake Ammer, to the club. There, the members built a boathouse and the harbour facilities; the sailors’ clubhouse was added in 1930.
Growing membership numbers and an increase in regatta activity characterised the period leading up to the First World War. Most of the club’s members were called up to serve in the war, and sailing came to a standstill, not only in Herrsching. But this was only temporary: as early as 1919, the races during Ammersee Week were enjoying brisk participation.
Setting sail on their own vessel – the members of the ASViM fulfilled this long-cherished dream in 1921. In Hamburg, they purchased the 10-sail-length cruiser ‘Monte-Christo’ and christened it ‘Wiking II’. The first voyages took them to Oslo and Stockholm; in 1922, the yacht was moved to Lake Ammersee in Bavaria.
…and what happened next
A heyday and a flagship without a galley or an engine
The club survived the Nazi era with relatively little interference. Following lengthy negotiations, the Academic Sailing Clubs were granted special status within the National Socialist Student Union, meaning that the club was neither dissolved nor did it lose its boats or facilities in Herrsching. Although the student members were required to transfer to a ‘comradeship’ within the Student Federation, sailing training was able to continue – albeit for a limited period. With the revival of university life in Munich after the Second World War, the ASViM also regained its student membership. “This marked the beginning of a new golden age, with training and regatta activities on Lake Ammersee, as well as sailing trips on the Mediterranean, the North Sea and the Baltic Sea,” says Philip Wenzel, who is now race director and instructor at the Academic Sailing Club in Munich. “A club-owned Spitzgatter was moved south from the Ammersee for this purpose, whilst in the north the club chartered yachts for its crews.”
In 1970, a 15.5-metre-long steel yawl named ‘Wiking III’, built by Dübbel & Jesse in Norderney, replaced the ageing flagship ‘Wiking II’. The yacht has been in service ever since – for crew training and navigation, as well as in numerous regattas on Lake Ammersee.
“On the Wiking, it’s all about sailing,” says Philip Wenzel. “There’s no galley, no toilet and no engine.” The boat is moored and unmoored under sail.
ASViM today
Training, regattas, sea voyages and plenty of team spirit
Traditionally, the focus remains on providing individual training in inland, offshore and regatta sailing for students at Munich’s universities. The club’s own fleet includes, amongst others, Lasers, H-jolens and Dyas, as well as the yawl ‘Wiking III’, Bavaria’s largest sailing vessel. ASViM boats take part not only in regattas on Lake Ammersee, but also in the North Sea Week, the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers and the Midsummersail; every year, the club organises a ranking regatta for Dragons and H-boats, as well as a yardstick regatta.
“We also organise an Optimist week every year at the start of the school holidays for the youngest sailors in the region,” says the ASViM race director. In addition, many club members travel all over the world: on chartered yachts or on boats owned by club members, they head to the Lofoten Islands, to Greece, around the British Isles and even across the Atlantic.
Before the start of the spring and autumn semesters, the Academic Sailing Club regularly organises so-called ‘activity weeks’ for students. The boats need to be launched or hauled out of the water – an opportunity to work on the boats together and get to know one another properly. Repairing, sanding, painting – “there’s always something to do on the wooden boats; the older members and our boatswain show the younger ones the ropes, and everyone pitches in,” says Philip Wenzel.
Declaration of love
Sailing brings people together and opens up a world of possibilities
The Academic Sailing Club in Munich was founded by students from the Technical University, but it was open to students from all disciplines right from the start. Today, students from a wide variety of faculties at LMU and TUM – such as engineering, architecture, natural sciences, mathematics, computer science, medicine, law, business administration, history and politics – are members. “In the past, membership of the club was reserved exclusively for men; today we are open to everyone,” says the club’s chairman, Michael Schoenberg.
What remains is the tradition that all ‘newcomers’ must prove themselves during a probationary year and take on roles, in order to then remain members for life and support one another – whether it be in sailing, at university, in their careers, ‘and through all the phases of development and change that life brings.’
Whether it’s financial, health or family problems – whatever the issue, everyone at ASViM agrees: “With innovative ideas, mutual tolerance, a wealth of experience and team spirit, we can help one another in many situations.”
Sailing brings people together – that’s what they’re convinced of in Herrsching on Lake Ammersee.
This is the Academic Sailing Club in Munich
The club is based in Herrsching am Ammersee, where it has a marina, a boathouse, a clubhouse with catering facilities, several meadows and a beach. The club’s approximately 110 active members have access to 14 club-owned boats, as well as 33 boats and eleven lake vessels belonging to members. Address: Rieder Straße 7–9, 82211 Herrsching am Ammersee; Website: www.asvim.de
