Our inspirators at Kieler Woche

A few weeks ago, we headed down to Kiel to support our 49er FX team (Julia and Klara) while racing at Kieler Woche 2024. It was a very spontaneous trip and we were only going for three days in total. Let me tell you this, three intense days had enough action to make it feel like we were gone for at least a week. 

Before I go into details about the eventful couple of days, the important question is: how did the girls find racing in the wetsuits for the first time? 

Overall, the girls found them incredibly comfortable, soft and flexible. They were wearing wetsuit jackets, long Jane and summer leggings. The only issue they faced some of the days was the hot weather Kiel for once decided to bring, where 25 degrees is a bit over the heat limit of the gear they had with them. Since our wetsuits are made of limestone, they are much warmer than petroleum-based neoprene wetsuits. (To give an example, a 3 mm Noora wetsuit is as warm as a 4 mm petroleum-based wetsuit). The first few days was it was a bit cooler and the girls absolutely loved sailing in them. 

Considering one of the main issues for girls is to find a wetsuit with a good fit, freezing often comes with it. To know that our wetsuits can be thinner and still keep you warm feels pretty cool. This gives lots of opportunities to make really comfortable gear all year around, without ever having to feel stiff. We're excited to design more hybrid collections for hot weather as well where we combine neoprene with other thin layer materials. We appreciate having such skilled sailors on the team. With their help we'll improve our products even more for 49er FX sailing. 

After beautiful days of racing, the girls rounded up the regatta with a medal race and finished in 7th place, what a great achievement! 

Besides cheering for the girls, me and Sara pushed ourselves outside of our comfort zones and talked to as many sailors as we could. It's a funny feeling being a sailor at a sailing event and not racing. We brought wetsuits to show, especially our drop-zip solution. Everyone we talked to were happily surprised over how soft the wetsuits are, and pleased that there will be another option than what is currently out on the market. We feel more motivated than ever after hearing girl after girl say the gear they're currently using is terrible. It's time to change it all up.

Side notes:

You might wonder, what else was so eventful about these days? The first day involved 10hrs of driving, snacking and charging the car before we got to Kiel. We then spent some time in the yacht club to meet some sailors, before we headed to the city where we lived. One of the least favourite things about driving in a city has to be the constant stress of finding a parking spot (and with an ID buzz we were also too tall for all the parking garages). After a while we found a great parking, free of charge with only one spot left. We decided to park there every night.

The next evening we thought it would be nice to have a little break and even see the Kieler Woche festival in the city. Unfortunately, Kiel hade other plans and instead we got stuck in a car charger for about 35 mins, without even charging?! When we eventually managed to pull the plug out, we had to find another charging spot and charge for another 45 mins... The festival in the end was actually really entertaining.

To top the trip off, the third morning, we went to get our car from this great free parking spot for one last time. As we approach we start wondering if we're in the right place. Instead of a parking, it was turned into a fruit market... Imagine the first feeling of embarrassment that our ID Buzz would be stuck under a fruit tent. If only that was the case, instead we get there and the car is gone? We had misunderstood the parking info (everything also in German) and our car was towed away because of the market. I've never experienced that level of confusion in my life before. But no need to worry, a nice soul helped us and we picked the car up 7km away.

And the rest of the day was great, meeting excited sailors before the medal race and then driving another 10hrs back home.

Definitely a success! We'll do it all again soon at another regatta (besides the car towing part). Keep an eye out for the next event.