Cruising Sailors Forum Archive

That's such a staggering design flaw.

To watch it while thinking about what you posted previously, it feels as though the boat suddenly becomes this enormous too slow to react, thing. Not all that dramatic, simply a regular heavy air situation, that had to avoided far in advance, to prevent pitch polling(wth?).

I can see this in a racing power boat that doesn't require maneuverability, they straight line start to finish. But a sailboat for any type of racing that requires rounding buoys, this is just a design flaw that invites coercing an opponent into this situation, so as to "knock them out" so to speak.

Not knocking the Cat concept, I think the speed and all is great for racing and to interest spectators(I'd love to watch from the shore). But while they have attained great speed, it's like the steering linkage is connected via a rubber band or something Rube Goldberg-ish, and they don't really have the means to control the boat in some conditions, even in a bay.

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