R Speculation

Guys, sorry i know i should but i am not going to post any pics or details of the boat.  As much as i love RS baiting, its not fair on them and at the end of the day i dont have the ime to argue with anyone over a forum nowadays.  So you will all have to be patient and wait for the official press release to come about or wait for RS to announce something.

Originally posted by iGRF So what is it? Originally posted by davidyacht Two strange looking RS single handlers sailing at Salcombe this weekend, with RS support RIBs, camper vans and cameras, Dacron rigs looked positively prehistoric compared with Solo 3DL's.  I often wonder how inconvenient the Solo is to RS, since I am sure if you we're designing a single hander to go with the RS200 or RS400 it would not be dissimilar to a Solo... Have RS finally realised their target market works for a living and is getting older, so wants a boat it can get back into if it falls over? I just hope they haven't made the mistake of not realising the target market also needs to be able to lift it onto a trailer without a crane. So c'mon, who knows what, time to spill, what are forums for and we know how much they love the viral world..

Originally posted by Daniel Holman The vareo ain't nice,

Easy now chap!

I like the Vareo, but if going for a non-spinnakered boat for the 10-14 stone market, I'd not start with it as a design brief. Thing is, whilst almost all the boats in that market segment are old designs, many of which have been updated, what does a new boat have to add? It isn't a market concerned with absolute speed, certainly not at the expense of ease of handling, but I can't see it gaining traction if beaten round the course by the curent market leader. So, if faster than the crowd, it still has to be as easy to sail. So, to make a boat faster without making it harder, you need to add length, mainly - so making a 12 foot boat to go up against the Solo, Streaker, Lightning, Byte etc is going to be a problem. So, maybe by making it 13 feet but keeping the sail area similar, you both gain WL length and have the chance to make sweeter lines. Combine that with a light but stable hull and a nice, easy to use but efficient rig, and maybe, just maybe, there is a market for it. Any longer than that, and you are into the Laser/Supernova/Blaze market, and you are then looking at a whole new ballgame.

Of course, if it was a 13 foot Rotomould singlehander, maybe with tweaked construction to make it lighter or stiffer, then maybe we would see the rise of the 1st adult roto raceboat? After all, Tera and Feva sailors are grown up, now, and not all want to go to the Olympics...

Originally posted by Daniel Holman Still no modern epoxy foam sandwich unstayed singlehander for average sized chaps on the market - yet. Pretty much every other market segment catered for but the biggest one. The vareo ain't nice, and the worlds attendance and general slowdown on the RS100 would attest to the fact that spinnakered singlehanders aren't the emperors new clothes.