Jörg Diesch

Sailors Jörg and his brother Eckart Diesch won a gold medal at the 1976 Montréal Olympics in the Olympic Yachting Center at Kingston, Ontario, in the West German two-person heavyweight dinghy (Flying Dutchman). They did not win a race, but had three seconds, a third, and two fifths as their scoring races. Prior to the final race the Diesch brothers noted that their centreboard was cracked. They were able to return to shore and replace it and get back to the starting line in time for the race. Therefore, they were awarded the Silver Bay Leaf, Germany’s highest sports award.

In 1968 and 1969 the Diesch brothers had won the West German Youth Championships. In 1972 they won the World Championships, also in Kingston. In 1974 they then won the Kiel Week and a bronze at the Europeans. In 1975 they added another bronze at the Worlds. From 1975-77 and in 1980 they also won the West German nationals. Due to the boycott of the 1980 Moskva Olympics they were unable to participate, but in 1984 at Los Angeles they finished fifth.

Their father Bruno was also a world class sailor during the 1930s before World War II, and their cousin Albert Batzill and their niece Stefanie Rothweiler also became Olympian sailors. Jörg Diesch later became orthopaedic surgeon with his own practice in Kiel. He later wrote a book about sailing regattas together with non-Olympian Hans-Georg Kauth.