Shortly before 3pm was the long awaited first race of the Tornado World Championships on Lake Biel.
The storm warnings and the hazy sky with clouds towers led to various discussions as to whether a start was too risky.
26 boats took to the water and were rewarded with one race completed. The westerly wind was blowing at a good twelve knots. First to the upwind mark were the local team of Jean-Marc Cuanillon and Michael Gloor (SUI 232) followed by the Greek European Champions Iordanis Paschalidis and Trigonis Konstantinos (GRE 7) and the World Champion mixed team from Germany Roland and Nahid Gaebler (GER 1). At the second mark the Greeks had taken the lead but the Germans were close behind.
A second race was started shortly thereafter but then had to be abandoned due to a rotation in the wind. The Tornados returned to port, a good decision by the race team because shortly thereafter the mountain wind kicked in resulting in gale force gusts.
After one race there are 3 mixed teams within the top 10; Roland and Nahid Gaebler, Martin and Julia Rusterholz and Nicole and Dietmar Salzmann.
Results (top10)
1 GRE Paschalidis Iordanis, Konstantinos Trigonis
2 GER Gaebler Roland, Gaebler Nahid
3 SUI Cuanillon Jean-Marc, Gloor Michael
4 GRE Mavros Nikos, Tagaropoulos Alexander
5 SUI Rusterholz Martin, Rusterholz Julia
6 AUS Burvill Brett, Duffield Ryan
7 ITA Sclavi Lorenzo, Reggio Paolo
8 AUT Salzmann Nicole, Salzmann Dietmar
9 CZE Krizek David, Zdenek Adam
10 GER Betz Markus, Betz Nikolas
Full results – Results after race one
Photos
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