But that’s all his team could afford. To sail year round, like their international rivals, the Poles sailed iceboats through the winter. Not only did Karol spend countless hours sharpening runners and working on equipment, he ‘learned how to read invis - ible wind shifts and make fast tactical decisions’. He learned from and aspired to being like generations of outstanding Polish ice yachtsmen before him. Ice sailing was rocket science compared to 470 sailing. Jablonski became proficient in the many aspects of a complex sport. He explains: ‘With ice sailing you have more components (over-bending mast, bending runner plank, hull and different types of runners) than in sailing and all of them have to work perfectly with each other. It takes years to learn how to set up the boat in different ice and wind conditions.’ If Jablonski had put those mythical 10,000 hours into mastering ice sailing by the time he reached his early 20s, he had also surpassed most of his soft water peers in making complex but often subconscious tuning adjustments.
At 21, the athlete was penetrating the upper rankings of the 470 class. Persistent and competitive, he pushed for better equipment and more opportunity at a time when Poland’s economic crisis was making it difficult for its citizens to acquire life’s necessities let alone import recre- ational equipment. The politics of the Cold War kept Jablonski from achieving his Olympic dream in 1984 when Poland boy- cotted the Olympic Games in Los Angeles.
That year’s political crisis had sent a shockwave through Iron Curtain sailing; Jablonski found himself no longer in a Polish Olympic squad but rather tooling around in an ageing Tornado.
To Germany with plank
Disheartened with the inability to get competitive equipment and eyeing Germany as the land of opportunity, at 24 Jablonski headed west with only his most valuable possessions… including a very special DN hull and runner plank. He had built the plank himself out of Siberian spruce that he had acquired from Estonia. He admits, ‘In the 1980s that was almost mission impossible!’ He used the hull for another five years or so. The plank made history; he rode his lucky charm for more than 15 seasons and won ‘a few’ world championships with it.
In Germany Jablonski set his sights on sailing big boats, which were, to all intents and purposes, non-existent in Poland at the time. He graduated from mast man on a One Tonner to joining the Kiwis, Aus- tralians and Americans in the afterguards of some of Germany’s most competitive yachts such as Pinta and Thomas I Punkt.
Twenty-three years – nine DN world titles
Jablonski won his first DN World Cham- pionship title in 1992 and his eighth and ninth Gold Cups in 2014 and 2015. In accepting congratulations on collecting another world title in 2003, Jablonski
expressed doubts that he would ever hoist the Gold Cup again after such a strong run… His continuing scoreline suggests otherwise. With 89 and 160 Gold Cup entries in 2014 and 2015 respectively, Jablonski finished one race out of the top five and breezed the 2014 title without sailing the final race. When asked his secret, Jablonski reflects quietly that ‘I sail just a bit smarter than the others and sometimes maybe a little faster…’
Conditioning
The Iceman still exercises almost every day: cross-training with running, mountain bik- ing, kayaking, weightlifting, cross-country skiing and Nordic walking, depending on the weather and how he feels. Of course, ice boating is one of his favourite ways to exhaust his body and recharge his brain. He waxes, ‘I remember years when I was flying straight from Florida to the DN racing, from big teams and big pressure to a place where suddenly you are on your own.’ ‘Softening’ a little with age, Jablonski listens to his body and allows for ample recovery time, especially after a day on the ice. Stretching is key to his programme and good nutritional supplements also play their part. Seven hours of sleep each night is ideal for the Great White Shark, but he doesn’t panic when he doesn’t get it.
What’s complicated about a DN? The DN falls into the same category as many of the early 20th-century sawn-rib, hard chine small boats like the Comet,
SEAHORSE 33
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76