German sailor
Johannes Sebastian Polgar (born 25 August 1977) is a German sailor, who specialized in the multihull (Tornado) and keelboat Star) classes.[1] Together with his partner Florian Spalteholz, he was named one of the country's top sailors in the mixed multihull catamaran for the 2008 Summer Olympics, finishing in eighth place.[2] After the Games, Polgar decided to move into the Star class and eventually shared a gold-medal victory with his partner Markus Koy at the 2010 Europeans in Viareggio, Italy.[3] A member of North German Regatta Club (German: Norddeutscher Regatta Verein), Polgar trained most of his competitive sailing career under the tutelage of his Norwegian-born personal coach Rigo de Nijs.[4]
Polgar competed for the German sailing squad, as a 30-year-old skipper in the Tornado class, at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. Leading up to their maiden Games, he and crew member Spalteholz topped the selection criteria in a duel against brothers Tino and Niko Mittelmeier for the country's Tornado berth, based on their cumulative scores attained at two international regattas stipulated by the German Sailing Federation (German: Deutscher Segler Verband).[5] The German duo started off the race series in the middle of the fleet until the shifty wind conditions propelled them to the front on the final half with a single victory and a triad of top-five marks, making both Polgar and Spalteholz eligible for the medal race.[6][7] An unforeseen capsize by the German duo on the initial run, however, saw their medal chances vanish, plummeting them further to eighth overall with 74 net points.[2][8][9]
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