Regatta News

In 2023, the Lübeck Yacht Club, the main organiser of the Travemünder Woche, will celebrate its 125th birthday. In keeping with the club's anniversary, those responsible for the regatta, Jens Kath (Sporting Director), Anderl Denecke (Overall Race Director) and Frank Schärffe (CEO), have put together a racing spectacle with speed and high class for the Travemünder Week (21 to 30 July 2023).

After the brilliantly beautiful days for Travemünde Week 2022 with lots of sunshine, almost optimal wind conditions and a mammoth programme on the regatta courses, the organisers also showed themselves with beaming faces. In their summary, TW Managing Director Frank Schärffe and TW Sports Director Jens Kath were happy about the ten eventful days that were offered to the approximately 1400 sailors from 25 nations. The festival on land was smaller than in the pre-Corona years and attracted nearly half a million visitors, according to Uwe Bergmann, managing director of the Hamburg marketing agency uba.

The last day of the Travemünde Week once again offered a wind scenario that had not been seen in the entire nine days before: Calm! As the prevailing wind and thermals worked against each other, no sailable breeze built up until the early afternoon, so that races of the classes that were still outstanding on this Sunday were cancelled one after the other. So the sea sailors, catamaran competitors, kiters and national league competitors celebrated their winners without any further races.
 

 

One day before the conclusion of the regattas, the Travemünde Week is heading for a top result in the number of races. The organisational teams have already sent their 22 classes across the starting line on the seven courses over 330 times, with a few decisions still to come. Even if the weak wind forecast for the final Sunday is correct, overall race director Anderl Denecke can draw a more than satisfied conclusion for the 133rd edition of the regatta week.

Until sunday, 18 teams each will be sailing in the First and Second Segelbundesliga directly in front of the Nordermole for victory on the third match day of the season. The NRV from Hamburg (First League) and the Konstanz Yacht Club (Second League) are consistently at the top of the two fields. But the sailors from Lübecker Segler-Verein also have a good chance of a podium finish in the Second League.

The thermal influences in the Bay of Lübeck can be relied upon: The wind did not set in until around noon on the eighth regatta day of the Travemünde Week, but then turned up with the support of the sun to bring the championships of the Ynglings and Dyas to a perfect end and to add more races to the list for the other classes. Only the kite-foilers stumbled. The north-easterly breeze of the past few days washed seaweed onto the courses and slowed down the sailors under the kite.

The sailors of the Travemünde Week take the term "final spurt" literally: Before the final weekend, the eight fleets on the six courses turned up the heat. With northeasterly winds of around five Beauforts, the sailors went down the waves in a rush. With a programme of up to six races, the athletes' arms grew long and the results lists filled up. While only the long distance of the sea course was decided on Friday, there will be a fireworks of four decisions on Saturday and five on Sunday in the coming days.

A tight start in the Trave, plenty of space on the Baltic Sea, atmospheric sailing in the dim light: For the sailors, the long-distance regatta for the Travemünde Week did not go around Fehmarn as planned, but there was no shortage of experiences on the course. It took the fastest yachts around twelve hours to complete the 66 nautical mile course from Travemünde towards Wismar, via Dahmeshöved, Neustadt and back to Travemünde. The crew around Alf Henryk Wulf (Kiel YC) was the first to steer the "Stardust" across the finish line in front of the Passat.

Colourful kite parachutes in the sky, boards floating above the water and breakneck speeds - the Olympic class Formula Kite is a real eye-catcher on the water with its International German Championship at the Travemünder Woche. Jan Vöster, who is currently in second place, is flying right at the front. The 18-year-old decided early on "I want to fly" and switched to kite-foiling with an Olympic course.
 

 
The Trave between Passathafen and Travepromenade turned into a sailing arena on Thursday for both the show races and the start of the sea course long distance.
 

The new world champions in Formula 16 have been crowned. With a very consistent performance, the only 15-year-old Thomas Proust from France and his coxswain Clement Martineau secured the title ahead of his compatriots Emmanuel le Chapelier and Eric le Bouedec. Bronze went to the brothers Robin and Sander Mineur from the Netherlands. The range of sailing conditions at the World Championships was extremely wide, from calm to light wind to strong wind. There was a lot of praise for the organisation of the World Championships from the active participants.
 

On the sixth regatta day of the Travemünder Woche, the schedule stumbled significantly for the first time. The wind decided late to turn from westerly to easterly, only to pick up a bit in the afternoon. Too late for the classes that finished their regatta that Thursday. This affected the Formula 16 and the Folkboats, who finished their championships accordingly with the result from the previous day. For the other seven classes, it was a case of start late, sail long. The day's work was only completed in the evening.

A hard day at sea, two European Championship decisions, a compact programme in seven classes: The Travemünde Week is not allowing itself a break, even at the halfway point, completing races in piecework and preparing for further exciting days with title decisions at World, European and German level. Anderl Denecke, the overall race director, also went into raptures: "Perfect day, we got all the races through. Nice wind, great waves. It was dream conditions," was his summary comment.

The final of the Sailing Champions League at Travemünde Week could hardly have ended on a more exciting note. After a commanding performance and clear victory in the preliminary round, NRV Hamburg entered the final of the top four with one point. Another point would have been enough to win the Final Four. But the Hamburg team around helmsman David Chapman made it exciting. Due to an early start in the first race, the team missed the chance of a quick overall victory. Instead, all three competitors also scored a point in the other races. It was only in the last of the four possible final races that the decision was made - in favour of the NRV team after all.

The Travemünde Woche has just started and the first crews are already celebrating. At the end of the opening weekend, the winners of the up-and-down races on the offshore course were crowned. SV Heiligenhafen (SVH-SSCH) had reason to celebrate, as they were the first-place winners in both the ORC and Yardstick classifications. Despite difficult wind conditions, a full programme was again achieved - also on the dinghy and catamaran courses.

League sailing is back at the Traveünder Woche - and not only with the 1. and 2. Bundesliga, but also with the Sailing Champions League (SCL). For the first time, the finals of the top class will be held in Germany. 36 teams from 19 nations will be sailing for victory until Tuesday. Six teams from Germany will compete. After the first four races, a tough top battle has developed between the NRV from Hamburg and the team from the Aland Islands competing for Finland.

Happy faces at the start of the racing events of the Travemünde Week: A light but well-sailable wind determined the weather scenario on Saturday and enabled a full programme on four regatta courses as well as the first appearance of the Trave Races, the show races in the Trave, in the late afternoon. The youngsters proved to be busy bees on their Hobie catamarans. They have already completed five races for their European Championship ranking. The J/22s managed three races at their German Open, as did the offshore sailors. And the Finns sailed in two official races before a small delegation of twelve dinghies showed their skills in front of the audience in the Trave.

 

The countdown for the Travemünder Woche has started and the anticipation among the organizers of the sailing and festival program is huge that it will finally start again. On Friday, July 22, at 6 p.m., the 133rd edition of the regatta week will be officially opened with the signal "Hoist the Flag!" by Mayor Jan Lindenau. After that, the fifth season of Lübeck begins until Sunday, July 31, with an exciting sailing program and the return of the festival to the promenades of the Trave and the Baltic Sea. At the kick-off press conference, those responsible for TW presented themselves in best harmony with the representatives of the authorities and the hope that the Travemünde Week can become a peaceful festival with a great deal of self-responsibility on the part of the visitors.

The Formula 16s are returning to Travemünde. Nine years after the World Championship in Lübeck Bay, the catamaran sailors will once again determine their global title holders at Travemünde Week (22 to 31 July). The F16 World Championship is the highest-ranking competition in the 133rd edition of Travemünder Woche, which is packed with sporting highlights.

We are shocked by the events in Ukraine, condemn this war of aggression on the innocent population. There is not much we can do as a sporting event for the people who are suffering this tremendous suffering. Our thoughts are with you and we stand with you.


In agreement with the World Sailing Federation and the German Sailing Association, we also exclude Russian and Belarusian athletes from our regattas and will not accept any entries for the Travemünde Week from these countries.