Blue Ribbon - Round the Lake Balaton Race the largest fleet competing (612 sailboats in 2009). During the race, the Transportation Rules of Inland Waterways apply. From 2014 the Hungarian Yachting Association has lifted the restrictions regarding multi-hull sailboats and today the race is open to everybody in the spirit of the founders. Blue Ribbon - Round the Lake Balaton Race Kékszalag or the Blue Ribbon Round the Lake Balaton Race is an international sports event held in Hungary every year between more than 30 boat classes. The regatta starts and finishes in Balatonfüred, after the 155+km circumnavigation of the Lake Balaton. By today the regatta became Europe's
Lake Balaton the late 19th century when landowners, ruined by "Phylloxera" attacking their grape vines, began building summer homes to rent out to the burgeoning middle classes. In Hungarian, the lake is known simply as "Balaton". It was called "lacus Pelsodis" or "Pelso" by the Romans. The name is Indo-European in origin (cf. Czech "pleso" ‘sinkhole, deep end of a lake’), later replaced by the Slavic *"bolto" (Czech "bláto", Slovak "blato", Polish "błoto") meaning 'mud, swamp' (from earlier Proto-Slavic "boltьno", , ). Slavic prince Pribina began to build in January 846 a fortress as his seat of power and several churches in