Fastest dinghy?

Firstly, I know Chris has sailed high performance cats first hand and isnt a bad sailor.  I know this because I race against him at our club.

Also I am one of those T sailors at the nationals and my Tornado can be steered with my fingertips and is very well balanced.  If I had a ball on the end of my tiller extension I could steer with it just resting on my fingers too.  However if we become overpowered and don't respond to a gust with the downhaul we will get so much weather helm that we cannot steer.  The Big T is very responsive to correct sail trim.  However I do conceed that a well balance mono's helm can be lighter.

Chris, just for your knowledge, the Tornado handicap has been droped further to 65.  As far as my coments go on what the yardstick should be.......  No comment

Cats also heel allot slower than a mono when graced by a gust.  Because of the leverage of cats, the gust is turned more efficiently into acceleration than heel.

Cats are also more stable than monos without a doupt.  Whilst waiting for a start you can realy veg out but if you do this on a mono you go swimming.  When the wind lightens, on a cat you can also drop the hull in the water and stay out, BUT this is slow.  You must move your weight in and keep the hull flying.  Whilst you are balancing on a thinner hull than most monos, as mentioned before, the heeling reaction to a cat is slower due to its efficiency to turn it into acceleration.

As far as our club racing goes and the layline chasing we tend to do....  Like I said on another forum, this is due to the very short courses we are racing with relation to the speed of our boats.  The course is also set to cater for the slower cats that race with us.  If you go to the major Tornado or most other performance cat major regattas, the courses are allot bigger and if you layline chase you get killed.

Chris, you joined our club being a mono man that met a cat sailing women and raced with her.  You have quiet often been vocal there about how much better the monos are.  I too came from a mono club sailing monos but I perfer cats.  That said I also love dingies also with the 12 skiff my favorite.  You prefer monos but love cats too.  This shows that it is an individuals personal taste.

As far as which is the best / fun boat to sail, I feel this is a stupid arguement as it comes down to personal taste.

Whilst Forbes is an absolute legend and a bloody top bloke, I do not agree with his fun boat comments.  This is his personal view and also mine but I recognize that everybodies taste and view will be different.

At the end of the day, wheather you sail a mono, cat, tri or board, fast or slow boat......  If you enjoy what you are doing than thats all that counts.

Chris, I also look forward to you getting into the Tornadoes if you go aheard with it.  Now that we have sold our T, I will be looking at bringing in a Marstrom Tornado from either Europe or US.  There are a few other blokes that are looking at doing likewise, so if you are interested, give us a yell.

PS - In the ,ean time it looks like I will be sailing with Ant until I get a new boat.

See you at the club.

Hows this sh@t for limp wristed

http://www.sailinganarchy.com/forums/index.php?act=Attach&am p;type=post&id=107759

Many thanks Scooby , but I do have a "scooby " myself.

I make a choice not to use the footloop or reaching line , as you say the 5.9 is very seaworthy  and fullsome in de bow , in balance I don't use above because :

1 > Reaching lines I consider a liability in that I worry (probably unduly) that they can catch on another boat - so I whipped em off as soon as allowed by class.

2> Foot Loops - used to be a fan of a rear one  (we all know the danger of front foot loops ) but I bought my current hurricane from a very experienced sailer from your neck of the woods , he had to give up sailing totally after tearing his knee cartlidge when spun around by a wave washing him off backwards from the boat , he waited over a year for it to heal properly before realising his trap cating days were over ,  made me think !

These are my choices , not recommendations .

With the rarity of p poling a 5.9 I feel happier with what I do , and my ribs healed .At 18 stone you don't often get a shot at free flight !

I've sailed 5.9s for many years too ,in good scottish howling winds , real cold heavy mass stuff, waves you couldn't  see a  100 foot coaster the otherside of in the North Sea on many occaisons . So when I said rare origionaly I knew what I meant.

Back under my rock now ,I'm feeling better , my flu is offski , and I better get some work done .

Enjoy your banter folks.

"Hulls Up "

It is a short line from the back of the boat that you can clip your harness to so that then you thump into the back of a wave at 30 Kts you have some hope of staying put. 

Some poeple have taken this a stage further (called Chicken Lines) and run then all the way along the boat (with a shock cord to tidy up) so you and then grab / or cleat them (added cleat on Harness)  to keep yopu incontact with the boat when it gets lumpy.

Some people don't like tham as you might get trapped in the event of a capsize.