Interview: DSV Vice President for Cruising and Leisure Sailing Claus Funk on current plans

At the 2023 Sailing Day in Bremen, the delegates elected Claus Funk from Wassersportgemeinschaft Hagnau on Lake Constance as DSV Vice President with responsibility for cruising and leisure sailing. He succeeds Clemens Fackeldey from the Berlin club Seglerhaus am Wannsee, who resigned in the run-up to the Sailing Day. Funk was the only candidate for the honorary post, nominated by the DSV Executive Committee. Until the dissolution of the DSV Cruiser Division (KA) by the Sailing Council in November 2023, this role also and above all included the role of chairman of this interest group, which was founded in 1911 and most recently had around 14,000 members. In future, it will be replaced by the "Cruising Sailing Committee", which has yet to be staffed and is part of Funk's remit alongside the Ice, Shore and Beach Sailing Committees, the RC Sailing Committee and the Recreational Sailing Committee.

• DSV/KA: Club of the cruiser division renames itself

While the KA was an independent body with paying members and an elected board, the "Cruising Sailing Committee" is to maintain the KA's services free of charge. To be able to use it, members of DSV clubs will not have to join the KA in future, but instead register as "cruising sailors in the DSV". In this interview, the new DSV Vice President Claus Funk explains what they can expect in return and why this should work better without the usual structure.

How did you come to your new position?

Claus Funk: Thanks to the outstanding persuasive skills of the General Secretary. I turned down all job offers after I retired, I just wanted to be free. But Germar Brockmeyer actually managed to get me nominated for this exciting position. We have known and liked each other since my time as head of the Constance Shipping Office.

You obviously had other plans for your retirement?

Yes, I wanted to sail via the Rhine, Main and Danube to the Black Sea and from there, after a longer trip, on to my favourite sailing area, Greece. But unfortunately that's not feasible for me at the moment and probably won't be for the foreseeable future. My wife won't go along with it, and it also poses a certain risk to me.

But you had already bought the right ship ...

Yes, a Malö 50, which we bought when I retired. Last summer we sailed it to Gothenburg and explored the archipelago up there. Then we travelled on to Stockholm via the Trollhätten and Göta Canals and sailed back to Kiel for winter storage. Just in time - two weeks later the Baltic storm tide arrived.

So, will you be staying on the Baltic Sea?

Yes, definitely this summer. To the Danish South Sea and then to the German coast eastwards to Ückermünde. That's also a beautiful place. I know it from the countryside and I'd like to have another look around there in peace and quiet. But then I'm drawn back to the Mediterranean. I miss the warm water temperatures in the north and the morning dips in the water.

You have been an active cruising sailor for more than half a century, have travelled all over the world and bring a lot of life experience to the office. Is there one issue that is particularly important to you?

Well, what I've noticed recently is that the way we interact in harbours and on the water has changed dramatically. And that scares me. Sailing as I used to know it, seamanship, helping each other and so on, I'm missing that more and more, it's becoming less and less.

You have the comparison - are there differences between the territories?

Yes, it's quite extreme in the Mediterranean. Up there in the Baltic Sea, I had the impression that, apart from a few, people were still courteous and just as you would expect them to be. You could even lie in a packet when it was completely overcrowded. That's no longer necessarily desirable in the Mediterranean. So that's what's been bothering me a bit recently. That would be an issue, and I'm thinking a lot about how the association could initiate this.

The DSV cruiser department was previously an instrument that was intended to convey such topics through the identification of members with common goals ...

I am sure that this will also work without the KA. Together with our colleagues from DSV, we are developing goals to reach people again. I have hope for that. I was a long-standing member of the cruiser department myself, and I didn't realise why it had been disbanded. But that doesn't make anything worse now. Maybe a little different, but change is part of life.

In what way?

A lot has changed in cruising in the recent past. In the past, the printed "Nautical News" offered by the cruising department was certainly more valuable than it is today in the digital world. Today, when I'm on the water, I quickly reach for my iPad for information. And the DSV with its cruising and leisure sailing department is very interested in adapting to our fast-moving times and being able to provide information more quickly.

And that was no longer possible with the cruiser division?

To my mind, the KA was a maritime-traditional appendage to the DSV. I myself associated the KA with blazers and gold buttons. I never liked that kind of fuss and I don't think it's really up to date any more. And I have the impression that the DSV is with me in this respect.

The KA has not only lost a dusty shell, but also a democratic structure through which members were able to get involved on a voluntary basis or vote on the interests of cruising sailors. Should this be compensated for? And if so, how?

Well, there are corresponding committees. And we work as a team. I will bring my ideas, or ideas that are brought to me, to the executive committee and then they will get things moving. The DSV also has full-time officials working in my area, and they also think about a lot of things.

In terms of organisation, KA was one of four departments in your division alongside ice, land and beach sailing, RC sailing and recreational sailing. How will this gap now be filled?

The KA will now be replaced by a new committee, the Cruising Sailing Committee, which will be made up of three or four volunteers who we will propose and who will then be confirmed by the Executive Committee.

Who is the offer aimed at in future, and how can it be accessed? Naturally, not all sailors in DSV clubs are interested in the special services for cruising sailors.

If you are a member of a DSV club, you can register free of charge and gain access to the offer for cruising sailors, which corresponds to that of the KA and has even been improved.

Have the 14,000 former KA members already registered, and do you expect significantly more of them to take up the offer in future?

At the moment, there are still far fewer people who have registered, probably because word hasn't got around yet, but we'll keep up the publicity. I'm sure we'll reach the cruising sailors. After all, unlike the KA, it doesn't cost anything.

What can registered cruising sailors expect from the DSV in the future?

Anyone who registers will receive a digital membership card and a wide range of discounts, such as the current KA. Our office also offers personalised sailing advice and a DSV app with push notifications on topics that you can select yourself. There is also a free weekly marine weather podcast with Sebastian Wache from Wetterwelt.

And what happens to the cruiser division's bases?

These have now been reduced from 101 to 13 on the North and Baltic Seas. It was important to us that there wasn't just a flag hanging there, but that there was actually something on offer.

And what will happen to the traditional driving competition and prize distribution?

It has been modernised. The invitation to tender has been finalised and is now being published. And there will also be a cruising day again.

Do you already have any ideas or visions of what should take place there apart from the prize-giving ceremony for the cruising competition? In its old form, as a general meeting of the KA, it should also fulfil an idealistic purpose as a family reunion of the cruising community ...

That's how it should be again. That is my whole endeavour, that the feeling of togetherness of the cruising sailors continues even without KA under the umbrella of the DSV.

Personal details: DSV Vice President for Cruising and Leisure Sailing Claus Funk

Born in Rottweil am Neckar, Funk first took to the water in rowing boats with his father. For his 14th birthday, he was given a sailing course in Überlingen on Lake Constance and obtained his A licence. While studying civil engineering specialising in hydraulic engineering in Constance, he expanded his sailing skills in the Mediterranean. Alongside his studies, he worked as a skipper and sailing instructor. In the seventies, numerous sailing trips in Greece, France, Corsica, Sardinia up to the Atlantic crossing in 1980, including extensive exploration of the Caribbean and later through the Panama Canal to the Galapagos Islands. He then began his professional career, which culminated in the management of the Constance Waterways and Shipping Office.

The first salaries were used to purchase his Dehler Optima 830 in 1983, which he still sails on Lake Constance today - alongside a Malö 50 on the Baltic Sea, which was purchased two years ago for longer cruises in retirement. In his home on Lake Constance, Funk founded the Hagnau water sports association with friends in 1989 because there was no sailing club there yet.