Anyone interested in surfing in the nineties could hardly avoid "Against the Wind". The ARD early evening series hit the big time in 1995 and caused a boom in surfing schools. Even though the sport was not the centre of attention, but rather the clique around the two main characters Niklas Andersen (Ralf Bauer) and Sven Westermann (Hardy Krüger Jr.), the beach soap was a perfect platform to promote the sport.
A total of 52 episodes in four seasons were broadcast between 11 January 1995 and 1997, with up to five million viewers tuning in. According to Wikipedia, this makes it ARD's most successful early evening series. Ralf Bauer and Hardy Krüger Jr. became stars, and "Against the Wind" was also the breakthrough for many other actors. From St. Peter-Ording, the later episodes also travelled to Maui and South Africa - never without drama, of course.
"Against the wind" on YouTube and in the stream
If you want to indulge in nostalgia, you can watch "Against the Wind" on YouTube. The Nineties classic is also available in better quality on the streaming platform ARD Plus available.
Professional surfers as doubles
The main actors in "Against the Wind" completed a 14-day crash course before filming began, according to the NDR in a review on the 30th anniversary of the first broadcast. This at least allowed them to bob around a little, but the real action scenes on the water were doubled by professionals such as Christian Kohl and the team from the St. Peter-Ording Surf Academy. This led to some bizarre cuts: while Ralf Bauer was still plucking at the beginner's rig on a large centreboard in the potholed water, an expert immediately turned into a front loop on the raging North Sea on the second floor. The only connection point was the brightly coloured windward neos of the respective characters.
Strange things also happen in the background during the beach scenes: rigs are constantly being held up and whirled around, boards are constantly being carried back and forth in a decorative manner - and living in the pile dwellings was unthinkable even in the nineties. But even if not all the stories have aged well, windsurfing has never had a bigger stage. And even after 30 years, the images are still iconic for many windsurfers of the teenage generation of that time. After the first few notes of the opening credits, almost everyone knows how Smokie's theme song continues: "Hold tight, here it comes again..."
Feature film as the successor to "Against the Wind"
After the end of "Against the Wind", some of the characters lived on in the follow-up series "Die Strandclique", and in 2021 Ralf Bauer brought a kind of comeback in feature-length film to the cinema:
