50 years of VDWS: "It's up to us to keep the enthusiasm alive" - Interview with Dirk Muschenich

Dirk, as a thoroughbred water sports enthusiast, you have been and still are active in various professional areas related to water sports and, with your many years of experience, have been working for the VDWS as Managing Director for five years. What was your first contact with the VDWS like?

You could say that I was born into water sports and teaching from my father, as my father was one of the first windsurfers in Germany in the early 1970s and went on to run various water sports schools. In fact, this is how I came into contact with watersports teaching, even though I am happy to admit that I didn't start out as a windsurfing instructor but as a sailing instructor. When the VDWS offered a special windsurfing course (Lake Neusiedl) for competitive windsurfers in 1988, I wanted to put my money where my mouth was and complete a proper training programme. I then realised quite quickly that the VDWS is not a typical association, but rather progressively tackles the challenges in our young water sports. It was and still is fun to work in a group of competent and highly motivated training experts.

What makes the VDWS special for you?

I think it's the diversity that makes it so appealing on the one hand, but also requires a lot of energy on the other. You have to imagine that there are people working at the VDWS who all have a background in water sports and have grown up with it. Everyone has gained their own experiences along the way and, as humans are, we are quick to assume that our own experiences are the only correct ones. If you then sit together in a group of experts made up of people who have at least as much experience as you do, conflicting convictions can sometimes clash. The challenge is then to find a way for our members (instructors and schools) and their customers (water sports beginners) that is (easily) communicable, safe and associated with the greatest possible sense of achievement. You can certainly imagine that different convictions clash in such a setting and somehow everyone is right. This makes it all the more exciting to observe how well and professionally everyone works together and how excellent the results are.

The moment when the penny drops and the pupil is simply happy - those are the moments that matter to me as a water sports instructor."

What moments do you still think about today?

Phew, that's difficult to answer because there are so many positive memories that I can't and don't want to weigh up against each other. For me, the great attraction of our profession has always been teaching my students to succeed. The moment when the penny drops and the pupil is simply happy - those are the moments that matter to me as a water sports instructor.

How do you think the scene has developed over the last few decades?

In my perception, the start-up phases of our sports (windsurfing, kitesurfing, SUP, sailing and wingfoiling) are massively characterised by extremely fast and radical development steps. It always reminds me a bit of the Wild West. There are no taboos, no limits and many extreme leaps in development. When windsurfing was the only trend sport at the beginning of the 70s, our customers were extremely willing to suffer for lack of alternatives and stayed on the ball for a long time, even if one move or another was anything but advantageous for the amateur athlete. In the meantime, trend sports have become inflationary and the willingness to suffer has been greatly reduced - people quickly reorient themselves if it doesn't work out the way they had perhaps imagined. It is in the nature of things that the producer - the manufacturer - is always endeavouring to bring innovations onto the market in order to boost business. I praise some of the leaders and thinkers in the scene who take things a little easier, a little more conservatively and professionally and who, like the VDWS, are and remain intent on conveying the fun and fascination of our sports by developing material and techniques that make the experience of success easier instead of just thinking about "higher, faster, further".

What do you wish for the sport, the scene and the association in the future?

That we succeed in keeping the fascination for our sports alive. This would mean that there are many people who try out our sports. It is then up to us, the scene in general, to encourage, motivate and support these people in order to keep their enthusiasm for water sports alive (in the medium and long term).

Interview: VDWS

More interviews on 50 years of VDWS:

• Ernstfried Prade on the beginnings
• La Chiappa - The first surf school in the VDWS