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Mission "Two really likeable people and a typical paddling accident" - Wannsee - July 2004
Berlin stands for greatness, glory and good weather. And also for the Wannsee tournament. We wanted to visit it again. We were joined by Felix, Doris, Pu, Lisa, Thomas, Dagmar, Sven and Nicole, our collected wife. How long has it been since Clausthaler went away and half of the riders were female.... . But back to the story.
The journey
We set off as usual. First goal: To park 3 cars in the café parking lot, taking up as much space as possible. Once again, we mastered this with aplomb, one quarter of the parking lot was no longer usable. Then we drove off, away from the dark gray cloud that is Clausthal, towards the blackness of the Braunschweig thunderstorm, and then turned east, to where the blue holes in the sky are. Unfortunately, Berlin isn't that close after all, so we also passed under the open sky and only stopped at the edge of the next cloud front. It was here that we suffered our first loss. We lost Nicole at an S-Bahn stop. So there were only seven of us left.
The weather held out and we cooked spaghetti. Well, we tried. Claus' petrol stove didn't really want to and Felix' gas stove only managed to bring the water to the boil before the cartridge was empty. We had to switch to the electric plates provided, what a start to the tournament.
Saturday morning
Saturday morning: The first game was against Berlin 3, a team of beginners, as we were assured. The 0:5 can therefore only be explained by the fact that the hailstorm helped us during the warm-up, but was already over by the time the game started. Shortly after our first game, the tournament was interrupted for the first time due to a thunderstorm and shortly afterwards a sailor strayed onto the field and capsized as soon as he was 200 meters away from the field. These guys have no idea how to paddle or roll, they just rely on the wind and can't even handle it properly.
Our second game: Freiburg. 0:10, clearly not a beginner's team. After the second game, the second interruption to the tournament, another thunderstorm. Consequently, the second sailor arrived sometime afterwards. He was even more committed, managed to tear an anchor off a goal and move it completely. In the following thunderstorm-hail mix (3rd interruption) he boasted that he had won the regatta and incidentally drank Dori's tea. We would like to call this gentleman the 1st sympathizer. We'll come to his drinking buddy, the 2nd favorite and boathouse keeper, later.
But our third game: Braunschweig. Experienced, playing for years, boosted with rum. 1:2, at least a moral victory.
3 games, 3 tournament interruptions, what's missing? Exactly, the third sailor. He was only there for a short time, he was quickly pushed out again, let's count him anyway.
This is perhaps the right place to finally mention our coach. He recently left the mountain as one of us and has been a player on a winning team ever since. It's always the same, they learn to play with us, leave and suddenly win. But they stay loyal to us, support us with their advanced strategies and see a light on the horizon even when we're already 3 goals down at half-time. "Come on, everyone!", this call regularly ensured that the second half wasn't as bad as the first. We would like to thank Howie once again for this.
The evening was only partially enjoyable, as our two supporters, one of whom has the right of domicile, had fun throwing empty beer bottles and urinating in the area. Unfortunately, the police who were called couldn't do anything. Over the course of the night, our first sympathizer insulted various paddlers and repeatedly tried to turn the boathouse attendant against us. However, he resisted to some extent, only throwing a beer bottle at the rest of us at the end.
Sunday
The next day, nice weather, a 1:7 against Hannover 2 and we really got to where we had, admittedly, already seen ourselves before the tournament. The game for 6th place. Would we reach it, or would Braunschweig end up there. We had lost our last game against Braunschweig, but after taking a 1-0 lead and drawing 2-2 in the second half, everything was wide open. After 20 minutes of play, however, the score was 2:4, so good, 6th place, in the A-tournament there was a 7th and 8th place, so we're not that bad.
The rest of Sunday passed by somehow. Mostly exciting games, sometimes clear results, no thunderstorms, just a comfortable tournament.
And then this call that woke a few people up from their lethargy: "Is anyone here a doctor?" What had happened? It was actually just a mosquito bite, but what was disturbing was the red line that had run along the veins from the wrist to the middle of the upper arm over the course of the day. I was in hospital that evening and was allowed to leave 3 days later. A mosquito bite followed by a stay in hospital, a typical paddling accident.
Sven