V Twin

Going back several pages.......the OK is one of the most horrible looking boats ever built and you need to be a limbo dancer to get under the boom.....but. Last year at Glossop SC, incredibly windy for a local trophy race. The wind funnels down the valley like an express train. Few boats even started much less complete a lap. After three persuit races the order was Javelin (sailed by husband and wife team, multi national champs and European champs). Second OK with modern rig and carbon mast third Byte C2 (the boy) fourth Byte C2. No other boats made it past the first race.
The Javelin at 17'7" is very fast upwind in those conditions. The ok coped well with the gusts and then had a knack of floating on its side with the mast horizontal to the water. The quite wide hull then shielded the sail from the wind, a little wriggle from the helm and up it came again. That OK never went over properly all day. Someone did try an 800 but that broke and came back as did a 400. The two best boats on that day were 'ancient designs', but they were the best.

I would like to meet the man who could build a light boat that could cope with that.

Come on young Fuller (be you Ms or Mr), get in your EPS and give it a good thrashing!

Originally posted by pondmonkey Fair points- but the weight game for elite sporting products has changed since Torbole.   I guess I'm saying the 49er hull seems to have stood the test of time- relative to the pace of technology-change in other aspects of our lives.

Hw come? A keelboat is a thing with balast on the bottom whereas a dinghy is bodyswung? Javelin is actually not that heavy but it is strong.

I didn't know you had written books on bike design Chris, what with you declaring that you are 'no expert'.

Originally posted by Andymac I didn't know you had written books on bike design Chris, what with you declaring that you are 'no expert'.   Whatever next; GRF writes a book on dinghy design.