Especially in your boat. I don't know how a tri tacks, but if I was in a monohull, I would have been sailing and short tacking. With the wind blowing like that, it just doesn't make any sense whatsoever to be motoring. My opinion. You were motoring at what, five or six knots? Under sail, you'd be beating at seven or eight knots.

When I was a sailor, the only time the engine was running was going into or out of a dock, or when boat speed dropped below 1 knot. Sailboats (monohulls at least) aren't designed to be power boats. You're not alone, of course. In my travels down the eastern seaboard, I'd see sailboats motoring on perfect sailing days, and I'd wonder why these people bothered to buy a sailboat at all. Just get it over with and buy a trawler.