"Fellow surfers, the big birthday of a great windsurfer in April casts a big shadow over us here at the Großkleinseer Surf Club," the board begins another of its rightly dreaded speeches. "There are many kings in sport: Marcel Hirscher, Muhammad Ali, Boris Becker, Maradona, Elvis Presley. Well, some are no longer alive, but he is, our king of windsurfing. The older ones among us will still remember how, at the age of eleven or twelve, he used to surf the adults backwards on the edge with his clumsy Ten Cate. A millennium talent.
In the years that followed, the blonde won one regatta after the next. The men admired him, the girls got wet... eyes. He was simply top, the number one. He was out on the water every day with his pink sail, which we all had to have straight away, remember? He got better and better - and his equipment got better too. I remember his father shaping his first custom funboards, which he mastered like no other. New manoeuvres, jumps, unimagined speed - it was a whole new surfing world, his surfing world.
With his success came new ideas. He opened his own shop, produced his own boards and even made videos. In short, the king became a businessman who always had a nose for the right trends. He was immediately involved in kitesurfing, SUPing, surfing and wingfoiling. Hah, a piece of cake for the King!
But now, after six decades, he sometimes feels a pinch in the back or front - and leaves the regatta and business to others. For years now, the King has only gone out on the water for fun or with his children, enjoying his free time to the full. He really deserves it, doesn't he? What hasn't the King done for our sport? Without him, windsurfing might never have arrived in Großkleinsee. Without him, our surf club might not even exist. That's why we want to honour the King, our role model, our idol. To this end, we raise our cans of Red Bull and congratulate the King at the top of our lungs. Happy sixtieth birthday, long live our King of the Großkleinseer Surfclub, Hermann Fischer! Cheers!!!"
