No need. You should be able to transfer it from 1and1 directly. If I'm not wrong when you register the domain name it's yours, not theirs, and because of that, they must allow through their application or sales to transfer the domain to another domain registrar.

With Namecheap or GoDaddy it should be pretty straight forward. I would recommend you contacting 1and1 and personally asking them to help you transfer the domain or just what is required.