Dennis started a promising career of sailing in the wayfar dinghy in Esbjerg, as a fast and energetic crew onboard the 'Yellow Sub'. Soon he got on to the idea, that it was all about high speed and fast sailing, and to his first Danish Championship everything should be toptuned. The wayfar was polished with a nice camelwool-polishing-device (most kindly borrowed from my dad ..?) and the boat were fit for racing.
Dennis is known for not owing anything at all, but even though he has everything. For an example he doesn't have a Volvo, mobilphone or no place to live, but still he drives a Volvo etc. He has a tremendous amount of contacts who provides him with what he needs.
It had to be like that for this danish championship, where Dennis had managed to get hold of two wetsuits. Now the wayfar dinghy is not known for being a wet dinghy, and therefore wetsuits isn't that useful, but as Dennis told me:" The air resistance of the crew is the main feature for high speed". So there we were in 30 degree celsius, with no wind and just boiling in our wetsuits for 4 days.
Dennis' promising sailing career disappeared with time. After some years with intensiv brainwashing saying " Racing is fun" and" real sailors don´t cruise", everything started to go upside down. After a summercruise through Europe and over the The Atlantic. The discussion between us wasn't about good tacking and fast jibes, but more like" boats with long keels has better stability in high seas", and "give me a 50 HPs engine and I will make Als within an hour".
In this period Dennis were often with me racing all over the country, so that he could feel the adrenaline and the joy of sailing, but nothing could come in his way. One day he called me on the phone and told me that he has just bought a 14 tons longkeeled steelboat, and that day I understood that the battle was lost. I realized that capitulation was the only way from here, because that ship would never be able to do any high speeds or fast sailing.
Dennis is raised in the town of Hjerting, and why people from his school only know him as 'Gonzales' is one the mysteries, which hopefully is going to be solved some day on The Pacific.