Single handed shortlist - longer

Hi Rupert
your wrong, at his size find a good helm and get a FD great boat for larger crews and enough strings to play with.

I am same weight range as Beardy and have crewed 505, FD Osprey and helmed rs400 and now the Phantom which I think is great for people of a respectable size.
If you can afford an epoxy boat do. I had a Lightweight grp boat and it was a mistake.
Have a look at the website for advice.

What ever you buy just get out there and sail as much as you can dont just race. an hour spent doing tacking and gybing practice really helps.

Good luck
Gordon.

Hi Jim c
see the last paragraph of the reply before to make sense of my comment.

Hello

I am i a similar position. Larger bloke, and have been out of proper sailing since 2007. Since then i have got a bit larger, due to lack of proper exercise and sat behind a desk for anywhere between 10-15 hours a day.
Personally i do not see this as an excuse. Before i drifted out of sailing my weight varied bewtwwen 90-100kg which put me at the top end of most of the mentioned classes. I am now currently about 110kg, which puts me outside of everything but Halo (where's the fleet?), Phantom (good one is out of my price range), Finn (even worse than Phantom).

If money wasn't the issue i would go for a Phantom, purely because they are a great boat sail, especially for my size but are also an amateur class with an excellent CA and open series. Maybe over time a D1 could intice me.

I am looking to get back into saling this year and am trying to work out my best options. With the right crew to complement/counteract my bulk double handers give me more options, however, having spent the last 5 years chasing promotions and becoming a bit of a workaholic (to quote my girlfriend)  i do not think i could guarantee straight away that i could commit enough guaranteed weekends to an enthusiastic crew.

With this in mind i feel my only option is a singlehander.

Previosly most people have said that xyz boats are not suitable so do not get them. Buy an older example of a boat suitable to your size. In my opinion this is good and bad advice. If a £1000 Phantom was competitive then why are no people with any competitive aspirations sailing them?.... simple answer is because a £1000 Phantom will not be as competeive as a £6000 with a similar sailer. But i don't think anyone would expect it to.

With my own personnal circumstance i have been looking at several things and one class that is interesting me due to locality of local fleets and initial purchase price is the supernova.

I am looking at this for various reasons.

1) My budget is £1k - £2k at present.

2) Localish fleets at nice lookin clubs.

3) After some research i have found that bigger guys than me do sail them, but not at the front of the fleet.

4) It won't cost me money to lose weight (infact it will probably save me money by living a healthier lifestyle)

5) When i was sailing before i was reasonable competative at club level with an old F15 against newer F15's. I knew at the time that if i could afford like for like that i would blitz a lot of of the people i was racing against. Getting back into sailing i would rather know that losing weight (which by starting up sailing i would hope to do anyway) would make me more competitive than flashing the cash.


To sumarise and explain i would say it all comes down to circumstanse.

If big chaps want good opens etc then Phantom/Finn/RS100?/D1? are really the only options. If you do not have much of a budget then D1/RS100 are out due to the short time they have been out and so cheap ones do not exist.

You can find an elderly Finn/Phantom but must be aware that if you have any aspirations to get anywhere near the top of the fleet you will have to buy a newer version.

If long term you will have a bigger budget and you feel you are healthy at the weight you are then the Phantom/Finn (depending on location) at present are you're obvious choice. If however (like me), you are also looking at losing some weight and getting fitter then i can't see a problem with getting a boat, that at present, you are too heavy for. Over time, if you do lose weight you will get more competitive.

If any Supernova owners read this then i would be very interested in your feedback on my views, because i might be totally wrong.

Graham

Graham,

As another 100kg (on a good day) sailor I'll also say +1 to the Phantom. I've owned 3, and other than the cost they really are a great boat for the heavier of us. However,  I've never sailed a Supernova as I had the perception, rightly or wrongly, that I wouldn't be competitive in one at my weight.  I'd be interested to be proved wrong though, as I think they look like a lot of boat for the money.