NORD/LB Baltic Sprint Cup 2005 - Leg 3 start

“Ladybird” left home, “Anita” will be back soon

The chase is on for the pack to catch up with the overall leader in the NORD/LB Baltic Sprint Cup, the X-442 “Emil Reiseschwein” from Buxtehude, Germany. In perfect weather conditions the start of leg 3 on Friday (15 July) took the fleet of 45 yachts out of the Bay of Tallinn heading for Riga, the capital city of Latvia. Right from the start two boats from Hamburg, Bavaria 42 match “Pippifax” owned by Gunter Persiehl and J-109 “Brinkmann & Partner”, skippered by Hans-Jürgen Rieckhoff, sailed in front in their classes B and C. Class A was led by Kiel-based “Outsider” (Tilmar Hansen). The leg, split in two parts of 65 and 88 nautical miles, will see the boats motoring through the Väinameri channel between the islands, for security reasons. The first finishers are expected to reach Riga in the afternoon on Saturday.

Only half an hour in the race a big yellow bubble brought a lot of trouble especially for the crew of “Beast”. While rounding this windward mark, the Sun Fast 37 caught the ground line of the inflatable buoy and towed it away. It took the German skipper Carsten Kneuer and his crew a lot of time to free themselves. They even had to take the yellow giant onboard to clear the ropes and get rid of it. Meanwhile all following boats had to round the buoy and the boat altogether meanwhile located at “changing positions”.

With “Brinkmann & Partner” in front the fleet went for the “Paljassaare” mark at the entrance of Tallinn Bay. “We will attack this time, we want the lead”, said Skipper Hans-Jürgen Rieckhoff in an “late midnight briefing” to his crew, after analysing the weather report. Beginning with a moderate breeze the forecast sees a weather change with possible thunderstorms and gusts up to 45 knots on Saturday evening.

The predicted strong headwinds made Achim Griese, helmsmen on “Pippifax” very happy. “That’s wonderful, we are ready”, said the Olympic silver medallist of 1984, looking back at the marina of Tallinn, where 1980 the Olympic sailing games took place – without the western nations due to the boycott. “The atmosphere has totally changed, everything is relaxed now, not comparable to the Sowjet union times”, he remarked.

Two yachts from the Baltic States are now sailing in the NORD/LB Baltic Sprint Cup fleet. “Ladybird” from Pärnu, Estonia, left home waters today and new entry “Anita”, sailed by skipper Arnis Remees will approach his hometown Riga within this leg. “Anita”, a 13.60 metre IOR racer from 1996 is flying the Latvian flag and sails within the wildcard rule allowing boats that cannot sail the whole regatta to start in the legs from and to their registered home ports. “We are happy to sail this race to Riga, even if we do not think we will have a chance against the modern yachts”, said Remees.

Onboard “Ladybird” skipper Erki Melts had to solve some crew problems early in the morning because some of the Estonian sailors had visited home and work offices during the stay in Tallinn and did not came back in time. “But the stopover in Tallinn was great; we have had party time for two days. I think everyone enjoyed it here“, said Aap Koha, boat manager from the “Ladybird” crew, speaking for all of the 400 sailors in the race.

Overall Results after two out of seven legs:

1. Emil Reiseschwein (Stefan Hummelt/ Buxtehude, Germany) 6pts
2. Pippifax (Gunter Persiehl/Hamburg, Germany) 13pts
3. Brinkmann&Partner (Frank Sothmann/Hamburg, Germany) 15pts
4. Ladybird (Erki Melts/Pärnu, Estonia) 16pts
5. Inschallah (Volker Andreae/Hamburg, Germany) 18pts
6. Anne Bonny (Hans-Jürgen Färber/Heiligenstedten, Germany) 18pts