Dirk Hanel ::: Kiteboarding

The BEST of 3 Event was held for the second time in Lake Silvaplana last Sunday and Monday. Olympic Gold medalists, World champions and Legends in different sports gathered together to fight in three different sports Windsurfing, Kitesurfing and Sailing and in 3 disciplines speed, slalom and course race of which team and who is the fastest on lake Silvaplana.

In the windsurfing Team it was 41 world title holder Björn Dunkerbeck, Karin Jaggi 15 times PWA world champion and windsurf speed world record holder together with Patrik Diethelm the fastest shaper in the Windsurf world.

In the kite team it was Steph Bridge 4 time course race world champion, together with Dirk Hanel, course race production master class world champion and German outright speed record holder und former nautical mile world record holder. The kite team was decorated with Ueli Kestenholz snowboard world champion and X-games winner, who is a passionate kiter and full on crazy extreme sports man! Also young gun Olly Bridge, son of Steph was in the kiteteam!

In the sailing team the strong Moth specialists Mathis Renker , 4 times Alinghi Swiss Tour Match Race winner and 7 time Swiss champion as well as Phillip Käsermann. They where joined by the German two champions in Moth sailing Markus Steeg and Nina Zühlke.

Every Team was also joined by local Heros and Riders in the different sports categories.

Sunday after the 35 th Engadin Wind Marathon was finished with a sensation as for the first time ever the two Kitesurfers Olli Bridge and Dirk Hanel where faster then the Windsurfers the start for two slalom races of the best of three was done.

As all sailors already had the 42 km Marsthon in the bones two slalom races where started. In the first one the windsurfers with Björn Dunkerbeck,  Nicklolas Warenbourg and Patrik Diethelm where dominating, but there was a small incident on the starting line of slalom 1 that slowed Dirk Hanel down massively and he could only catch up to position 4.

Second slalom then all good a good and clean start and Dirk was right in there on the first jibe mark with Björn and Nicklas. Then on mark three dirk overtook the Windsurfers in the jibe and with having same or maybe even a bit faster downwind speed he held on to the victory in the second slalom. This was a great success for Dirk being able to beat Björn who is also currently leading the Slalom Tour of the PWA this year and also Karin Jaggi leading the tour in slalom it was great for Steph to beat her in the direct comparison. Then a big rainstorm came and with a good forecast for day 2 we all called the day.

Day two of the Best of three started out with 4 CourseRaces where again Olly Bridge and Dirk Hanel dominated the races taking all wins and three of the 2^nd places in all races.

The starts where always really exciting and sometimes close calls! Then the complete fleet was literally flying towards the other side of the lake. Most races the kiters where faster and still had a very good upwind angle, while the Moths had an incredible upwind angle the combination of angle and speed gave the advantage to the kiters. So after 4 races Olly was in first and Dirk in second followed by Mathias Renker in the Moth in 3^rd place.

Last but not least was the discipline speed. All athletes where going for it. The judging tower was equipped with a speed gun and communication display for all of us to see the maximum speeds! The wind was getting a bit gusty and with big holes so it was hard for all athletes to line up perfect and get the fastest runs in! In the end it was best speed by Björn Dunkerbeck with 60,3 km/h followed in second place by Patrik Diethelm, the fastest shaper in the world with 59,3 km/h and Kitesurfer Dirk Hanel and winner of the speed last year with 57 km/h. unfortunately the kites which performed so well in racing and also slalom just where not perfect for the speed due to an to flat profile.

After the speed discipline the organizers where happy with all the action and called it the event. Team Kitesurf took a great Victory in the team category for sure also because of the great performance of Steph Bridge beating Karin Jaggi in each discipline and also Kitersurfer Dirk Hanel taking the win in the Individual Ranking.

At the end of the two days everyone had such a great time and we all agreed this has to be repeated in the next year with some more refined rules, maybe also at other places and in different conditions  but for sure the same fun and enthusiastic teams like this year!

Final Results:

Team BEST of 3

1. Kitesurf Team
2. Windsurf Team
3. Sailing Team

Individual BEST of 3

1. Dirk Hanel                       8 points
2. Patrik Diethelm          10 points
3. Björn Dunkerbeck      11 points
4. Olly Bridge                    12 points
5. Steph Bridge                 26 points

11.  Karin Jaggi                    30 points

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