No DN sailing but a video for the "Warmduscher*"

No DN sailing last weekend. Good Conditions only in Poland but a 15 hours drive away. Some of our DN friends took part in the DN World Championship this week where Bernd, G-107 came 3rd and former W/C Ron Sherry, US-44 finished 4th. Congratulations! Also the junior, Max Minarek, G-479, did well. Find more information through my links > Eissegeln.

Normally I would not like to recommend a youtube video here but this one: GEANT, Orma60 tri in a breeze is something I had to watch several times. Michel D in mid Ocean sailing GEANT, the ORMA 60 tri, upwind in a breeze. Wow. Comparing this to the Fomula 40 sailing, which I did years ago on Lake Garda, I think I was in Kindergarten.

Das mit dem Tri ist definitiv nichts für Warmduscher und auch nichts für Forumsegler. Eisberichte vom Solgen, Schweden klingen gut. Morgen geht die Rundmail raus, wenn unser Scout vor Ort grünes Licht gibt.

*Warmduscher = staying home and taking a hot shower instead...

No Iceboating, Weather is going crazy this Winter

We did not drive to Sweden last weekend for the DN regatta. The weather report did not convince us. Not enough wind at the Mälaren. Some Dutch friends made the trip, which for them is 5 hours more, and they did some racing in snowy conditions. They did well, they love these conditions. Maybe we should not look too much into the computer and try to analyse the weather, just hopp in the car and go. As we did in the years before Internet.

I got a nice respond to my thread: "Who is your sailing hero?". Very interesting to read. Look at the comments and give me yours: Sailing Hero, comments...

DN Sailing - a trip to Sweden on Feb, 2nd.

This blog had been started in December 2005 because I wanted to tell some of my friends about iceboating in Germany as well as keeping a log myself. Long time ago I had given up to write shortcuts into my trim-book. With the ever changing hardware and style of sailing as well as with new knowledge, all the numbers, written down, did not help me at the end. New Technology also made the book, with regards to roadmaps, redundant. Nowadays you are finding the smallest lake in Nowhere-land with your little GPS. On the Swedish Iceboat site they are showing the Long-and Latitude of the places to go. Just type it in and go >> OK, sometimes you have to drive for 10hours and more as we did last weekend. It is not always freezing in Germany as it did, when I started this sport. 7 years in a row we went iceboating nearby. The next 7 years we had to travel. Another 5 years of fantastic conditions in Germany after that and again some weaker wintertime following. Sometimes it was cold but way too much snow for sailing. Tried it of course but got stuck in snowdrifts. Some friends broke their boats. One of my friends started with a well built DIY boat on such a "bad" day. He got stuck several times. In the bad mood he put himself, he lost his boat from the car roof and we had never seen him again on the ice. I remember that on the Sunday after, the snowdrifts had been softened and we had some great racing. W. Schwarten was showing us how to do it and won most races by length.

Back to last weekend. Arriving in Västeras at 03.00h in the morning, going for a pee on the ice, checking if it really was there and a couple hours of sleep in the Camper. The sun was waking us up in the morning. The reed on the lakeside showed signs of wind and we knew already, that it was worthwhile to drive up all the way to Lake Mälaren. 13 boats from Germany, 2 boats only from Sweden went out for some thrilling practice races in a good Force 4 Bft wind on fast ice. A good training for the upcoming weekend when the Swedes have their official race weekend, which takes place every fortnight in different regions of this big country. Anyone who wants to read more and wants to improve his German language skills should go to:

My German report. The photo had been taken on the launch site.