49er Lite

Originally posted by Menace

Originally posted by Menace

I think Ben McGrane had a Sports rig a while back but can't remember 100 percent.

I may be being a bit simple here, but when they did the rig upgrade on the 49er, they said they had to up the sail area to compensate for the drop in mast weight to allow the competitive weight range to stay the same and not drop to circa 130kg. Using that logic, you could have a similar sail area to the old tin rig but with a carbon rig and that would be okay for the girls. 

I'd update the sail profile a little ie square head main and maybe slightly flatter sails but keep the same kite. Then you'd have a boat comparible with the 49er for the girls. The main contender in my eyes is the RS900 at the moment. Being blunt and I hate to say it, I don't see the 29erXX coming close as I think if it was the right boat, more people would be sailing it by now. I could imagine if they released the 900 tomorrow, you'd have people flocking from the 800 and people like me queing up to place an order. If there was a "lite" rig for the 49er, bang, theres the answer to the 900. Could be horribly wrong but this is just my gut instinct.

I can't see how a small rig 49er could fit for girls. For instance, I think it would be veeery difficult for a 110/115 kg crew to right such boat in a breeze. IMHO If Bethwaite really wanted to make the "perfect skiff" for girls, he would need to create a totally new boat. I own an XX and it's a pretty nice boat, but of course it' still a compromise (and the 29er hull is not exactly built for the sole purpose of performance); I share your view that the rs900 is likely to be the best boat in the trial. We'll see next year what it's going to matter (performance, diffusion, pricing, politics, etc..) in the trials.

back on topic, a friend of mine for the old 49er rig ordered to a local sailmaker a "bat-style" main, cut down between battens, but he told me that the result wasn't great.

I can't wait to see