Racing Sailboards v Racing Sailboats

Originally posted by G.R.F.   i'm much older than most of y'all and with that comes a collection of more experience and if that comes across as arrogance well so be it.. Us Old Folk have earned the right..

Ah but G.R.F. It's with observation not old age that brings wisdom.... have you observed all of life's little lessons? 
In fact I think you have seeming as you choose for things to be interesting and spark a bit of fire rather than be "correct" and polite.  I think I was the only person who watched Batman Dark Knight and was on the Joker's side!

You gotta hand it to the old fella. This place would be a poorer place without his contributions. Almost all Grumpf's posts raise a laugh in me or a 'here we go again'.

Go on, tell us. What's the single hander you're selling? (Can't find any reference to dingies on your website...

I too have been clocked at 34 kts - I was flying round the forestay at the time! 

Well I've done 29.5 knots on one myself and Stacey (guy who works with
me) did 31.5 kts the same day, so I can't see any reason to disbelieve the
French who claim 34 kts, it's not actually that fast in windsurf circles and
the guy who claimed it is six foot six and weighs 100 kgs..

I reckon that traditional long boards could probably go faster, something
like the old Mistral One Design, once the track is pulled right back and
you're in the back strap there aint much board in the water.

The thing the Kona has is a stepped hull, so its wetted surface is much
less than its waterline length once it's up on the plane, but it doesn't have
a mast track, the hull step thing sort of does that for it.

It's 360 long but the underhull is more like 310, it's not that competitive
against full blown race boards it wont quite live with a laser upwind but
will take it apart off wind in a blow, in sub planing I'd put it around 1080
handicap wise.

They are great fun to race against each other, being easy to sail and
uncomplicated, I've got a picture somewhere, I'll maybe look it out later
and edit it in, taken in Ireland at an event we ran out there.


Here's an idea.

We run a fleet of them for demos, how about this as a decider.

We get a Fleet of Lasers and a Fleet of Konas then we hold an event where
you have to race 3 events on a board and 3 events on a Laser, you lot can
have your man whathisname the Olympic guy and I'll take him on, who do
you think would win?

grumpf.. as much as i would love the windsurfing to win in your make-believ competition but ive held a race like this... and needless to say the sailboat won and convivncingly until the wind picked up for me to plane  consistently... its a matter of what you want to do because... if your a sailor then sailing is your favourite but if your a windsrufer then windsurfing is the best for you..

g=]