Runner-up in Marbella, and three questions every race contract has to answer

The MotoSurf World Championship closed its European season in Marbella from 11 to 13 September 2026. NAMMERT backs Laureen Thellin Deprez and the Racing Penguins team, and the reason is not the photograph. Over three days a race weekend loads, drops, breaks and repairs a great deal of equipment, so it is the fastest way to see where a contract written for a moored motor yacht stops working for a jet ski or a racing jet board.

In the Women Masters class Laureen Thellin Deprez took second place, behind Eujin Lee of South Korea and ahead of Tereza Kadlecova of the Czech Republic; Jennifer Beckmann from Hamburg finished fourth. Kai Biskup was starting only the second world championship round of his career and improved visibly across the weekend. His own goal had been modest, namely not to finish last, and he met it. The national coach spoke of promising potential.

The third Racing Penguins rider, Robert Hesselmann, never made the start line: his board was left behind at the airport. That line appears on no result sheet and is the most interesting one of the weekend. A board that does not arrive is not a damaged board. Hull cover responds to physical damage to the thing insured, not to transport that failed to happen, and a rider who loses travel and entry fees that way has a claim against the carrier or against nobody.

So to the first question. Most wordings for a jet ski, a jet board or a trailer boat exclude participation in races and the training that goes with it, quietly, in a single line among the general exclusions. Anyone who reads only the first page will never find it. Before an entry is paid, the exclusion list is the page to read, and if racing is excluded, the insurer has to be asked in writing whether it can be bought back and at what deductible.

The second question is liability. In the paddock, boards, trailers and equipment belonging to other teams stand close together, and the most expensive damage happens while manoeuvring, craning and launching, not out on the course. Sums insured that look generous for private use look thin when a whole paddock is at stake, so the figure in the schedule deserves a second look before the season rather than after a claim.

The third question is the body. In motosurf you fall; that is part of the sport, and the injury costs more later than the board did. Personal accident terms differ widely between markets, and some wordings reward a helmet worn at the time of the accident. It is worth asking, because in this sport the helmet is compulsory anyway and the clause therefore applies almost every time.

That leaves the part the race office wants to see, and it is about to change. From 2027, liability and personal accident cover will no longer be part of the UIM racing licence issued by the German Motoryacht Association; the licence fee drops accordingly, having stood at 400 euros a year. The requirement to be insured stays exactly as it was, but the proof becomes the rider's own job. A medical certificate and the safety course known as the turtle test remain conditions for the licence. Anyone racing in 2027 sorts this out in January, not at the ramp in spring.

Two further world championship rounds are scheduled in China for October and November 2026. Whether the team travels is open: school, work and the cost of freight decide that, not form. Wherever the next start line is, the paperwork travels with the board, and that is the part a rider can settle weeks in advance.