Highlights: Day 7 at the World Cup Sylt - Kördel takes first victory, Vrieswijk takes the lead

Same procedure as yesterday: After a largely calm morning, the wind picked up around midday and the slalom eliminations eight to ten at the Mercedes-Benz Windsurf World Cup Sylt were able to start. In contrast to yesterday, the wind had shifted 180 degrees and was blowing diagonally offshore from the south-east today.

Sebastian Kördel got off to a perfect start and made it into the top eight with second place in the first round and the semi-final. There he drove even better and took victory in the first elimination of the day. "This victory feels great. Celebrating your first success on Sylt in front of a home crowd is something very special. I was incredibly nervous during the final run. When you're in the lead, you don't know how big the gap is. I could hear the sails flapping behind me at the jibes and knew that I had a lead of about a second. What a race," he said afterwards. Things didn't go quite so well in the following two eliminations: an eighth and a twelfth place meant that Kördel slipped down one place in the event ranking, partly because there was no third stringer today. This is only available from the twelfth elimination onwards.

Bitter day for Maciek Rutkowski

The previous leader Maciek Rutkowski, on the other hand, had a bad day. In the first elimination, he got into a scrum at the first buoy and retired early. No matter, as he was able to count this retirement as a stringer and his pursuer Pierre Mortefon only came sixth. Things went better in the second heat with third place and Rutkowski extended his lead to five points. However, in the tenth elimination overall, he crashed in the semi-final with a massive skid and only finished ninth despite winning the small final.

Pierre Mortefon can't be completely satisfied either, he took two sixth places. However, in the final elimination, in which he could have moved into the lead after Rutkowski's slip-ups, the Frenchman finished a wafer-thin fifth in the semi-final behind his compatriot William Huppert. No final, no valuable points.

Amado Vrieswijk was as consistent as a squirrel. The 2021 freestyle world champion had announced that he wanted to focus mainly on racing. After a mixed start to the event, he took his first win yesterday, and today, the blonde-haired rider from Bonaire was also incredibly strong and consistent with a third and two second places. The reward is the lead in the Sylt standings, one point ahead of Rutkowski.

Double victory for Enrico Marotti

Enrico Marotti from Croatia finished ahead of Vrieswijk in the ninth and tenth eliminations. As a very consistent rider, he can regularly be seen in the top ten, here on Sylt he consistently improved and was also unbeatable for Vrieswijk. "I am over the moon. I didn't really make any mistakes in the two runs and was also very good tactically. The conditions were a bit easier today than yesterday and suited me much better," reported Marotti afterwards, adding: "I really want to thank the fans here on Sylt. They really push us and we really appreciate that!"

Yesterday's sensational winner, Johan Søe from Denmark, also showed his class today and was in every final. Matteo Iachino was also strong, but missed out on a place in the final by a wafer-thin margin in the ninth elimination and was extremely displeased with the regatta organisers' view of the photo finish in his heat. Antoine Albeau struggled again and was unable to confirm his improvement from yesterday.

The two other German starters, Nico Prien and Malte Reuscher, were also unable to make up any ground. Reuscher made it into the small final once, but otherwise it was over in the semi-finals at the latest.

Standings after ten eliminations (two strings)

1. Amado Vrieswijk
2. Maciek Rutkowski
3. Matteo Iachino
4th Pierre Mortefon
5. Mateus Isaac
6th Enrico Marotti
7th Johan Søe
8th Sebastian Kördel
9th Nicolas Goyard
10th Jordy Vonk
18th Nico Prien
20th Malte Reuscher

The World Cup Sylt continues tomorrow

It's time to get up early again tomorrow, the skippers' meeting is scheduled for seven o'clock. Tonight it is expected to blow at over 30 knots, the regatta organisers hope to be able to use the last few hours of strong wind for freestyle tomorrow morning. Later in the day, it looks more like there will be more slalom eliminations with around 15 knots - provided the shorebreak allows for safe starts. On Sunday there is a good chance of more freestyle or wave heats!