I was thinking about which class I will eventually join when I have money and am no longer a poor student.

This summer a spent some time sailing RS800s and 29ers. The RS800 was cool and pretty fast, but I always felt kind of disconnected sailing it. The 29er although definitely slower, felt more exciting A laser in a blow downwind which is much much slower, is still loads of fun.

I think it's down to the size of the boat, the sort of go-kart effect. This is taken to the extreme with windsurfing which is really awesome (as long as there is enough wind!). Has anyone else experienced this?

I currently have a modified I14 which I’ve only sailed twice, but due to light winds and asymmetric problems I have yet to see her true potential. I’m pretty sure I’ll stick with my 14 for quite a few years yet. For £800 this boat is an absolute steal! To get a boat with racks, self tacking jib, T foil things start looking very expensive though. Most 14s seem to be very expensive off the shelf beiker designs kinda defeating the object of a development class. Maybe an ovi 2 or something with some work may be affordable.

The cherub class looks very interesting. I wanted to buy one instead of the 14 since my sister and I would be more suited to it weight wise, but there were hardly any available used for around £1000. Lots of them seem to be wood (maintenance issue) and have aluminium masts/symmetric spinnakers still. They seem to be getting with the times recently though! Anyone in the southampton area want to give me a ride in one?

Racing is of no consideration to me, I just want to go really fast. Most windsurfers never race, same goes for snowboarding and ‘extreme’ sports. Tried racing and didn’t like it. People yelling/bitching at each other and protesting is a weird idea of fun on a Sunday morning. My first open meeting 2 out of 18 boats had holes in their sides after the first start.

Im not sure weathe the size of the dinghy affects its 'fun-ness' but i think it depends on the person sailing because if you want close tactical sailing but alos a lot of fun you would go for a topper where if you wnated pure speed an 18 ft skiff would be the best but theres no point in having an 18 footer just for fun and not racing, they are two expensive to maintain and not the right boat for cruising!!!! 

Did a couple of seasons club racing in an Enterprise back in the day and also a few races in a 29er. Racing really seems to bring out the worst in people and I've found even at local club level, people are needlessly hostile on the water. We had one guy who came mid fleet in the series forcing a note put on the bottom of the published results about a 2 boat situation which didn't even change his position! This is just Sunday morning club racing! We have also had people come in on port yelling starboard so we had to avoid a collision, and so miss the mark. These were experianced sailors, they knew they were on port!

Another situation I've seen on the water was a guy infringe at the windward mark 1st time round. Instead of doing his circles he just sailed in and packed up his boat. The weather was perfect, so even if he didn't want to continue he could have just free sailed instead.

On the other hand I've had some really enjoyable informal races against some of my mates in lasers. Great fun. We allowed kinetics and hitting marks too. Some people need to leave the ego at home, chill out a bit and try and have fun instead of trying to prove a point. Sailing already has an image problem, the amount of red tape/cost to just join some clubs on the south coast is crazy.

For these reasons I have avoided racing and just changed class when I can manage the boat OK in a blow, then move on to a more difficult boat.

If you look at the bigger picture of sailing, all dinghies are small boats. Are dinghies more fun than keelboats? You might give a different answer at 20 and 50.

I don't understand why anyone who "just wants to go fast"  sails dinghies. Cats, windsurfers or kite-boards would be the way to go for that. Dinghies seem a bit pointless if you don't race them and you won't really be "joining a class" unless you race.

Hi m_liddell, it sounds like you need to change club not class.  You wouldn't find much of what you find unpleasant at clubs like Bough Beech or Wilsonian.

As for the comment about kite surfing and boards - well I can umderstand the comment and you really should try and master those sports but for me going upwind is the most demanding and hence rewarding sailing you can do.  Hence I sail a Laser4000 - fast upwind - and faster still downwind so I can quickly get back to leeward to go upwind all over again.

Does that mean at opens, the locals give the visitors a surfer-style welcome and beat them up?

On the same kind of note you could say the same thing about sports boats, why sail a sports boat when you can sail a faster dinghy or skiff? Totally disagree with that point of veiw though because everyone enjoys the sport in their own way and we all sail boats which are suited to what we can get out of own enjoyment, hence the reason I only ocasionally sail keelboats and feel at home within a dinghy or skiff.

I've sailed both dinghies and sportsboats, more the latter recently. Almost everybody I know who sails sportsboats has also sailed dinghies: it would be pretty intimidating to start your helming career in something that can do as much expensive damage as quickly as a keelboat in a big fleet can, and also have to take responsibility for a crew of several people, not just yourself or one other. Attractions of sportsboats: really the ability to spend the day on the water in something approaching comfort while also having an exciting sail, at least once its windy. I'll admit it's partially an age thing, and in my 20s blasting around on a short board was more my idea of fun.

I wouldn't sail either dinghies or sportsboats just for fun though. Both are race machines: both have better alternatives at either end of the spectrum if you just want a good time on the water (cats/sailboards/kiteboards and cruisers).

http://www.i14.org/forsale/index.php - http://www.i14.org/forsale/index.php

Here - look at the UK boats, penultimates a couple of Ovi Benedict 4's for under 1000 pounds...

lol. I think older 14s offer the best performance/price ratio ever  The modified ones appear to be the cheapest since they can't race against the penultinates and are not really competitive against the new ones.

There have been quite a few 14s on ebay going for under £1000...