Since he was a little boy, Roland had an active lifestyle. Meanwhile his mother had a shoe shop in the city of Bremen, he was the most of the time in the country side, while his father was renovating old farmer houses. At that time Roland had his first experience on wooden platforms on the water of a small river.

Then his father bougth a little sailing dinghy and he starts the first trips on a little lake near Bremen. But the little sailing dinghy was not strong enough for Rolands hard manouvers and he ruins it. But his parents saw that their son had a big talent to sail and then they bought an old Laser dinghy, which was very popular on the river Weser. The river goes directly through the city of Bremen. Since then he was sailing every minut after the school. At the age of 14 he was sailing the first Regatta, but he finished last. But then he startet to train together with older expierienced sailors and he was getting better and better. At the age of 15 he won the first Regatta and as he was 16 he was close to win the Kiel-Week in the Laser Class. Only a protest prevented him from winning. He sailed over 6 years Laser and he won 2 European Championships and 14 other International Laser Championships.

At the age of 23 he started to sail Tornado with his trainingpartner from the Laser Hans-Juergen Pfohe. After only 3 years he was qualified for the Olympics in Korea. But he finished very badly, because he broke his hand. After 1988 his old crew did not any time for sailing, and Roland started to sail together with Frank Parlow. Together with Frank Pralow he won 4 European Tornado Championships and 1996 finnally the World Championship . He was sailing together with Frank Parlow in Barcelona and Atlanta for the Olympic Games. From 1997 Roland is sailing together with Rene Schwall and together with him he won the Tornado World Championship again in 1997.

But for Roland sailing is not everything. Since 1993 he is living in Denmark together with his wife Nahid on an farm near the German border. Together with her he is renovating the old farm. Roland & Nahid has two danish warmblood horses and two ungarian racing dogs (breed: "Magyar Agar"). One of the dogs, "Dea", is trained by Roland and Nahid intensively. This speedy lady won 2 World-, European- and German Championships during the last 3 years and is a "doggy" sport-televison star in north Germany. She run the 480 Meter racing distance in 30 seconds.

Now Roland is planning his next Tornado Olympic Campaign for Sydney 2000. The Tornado Saling will also in the future be the main challenge, but beside the sailing he wants to get active in other sailing- and sportsprojects too.