Pete, I'm reading your original post ,
"I have difficulty with chop.

I sail with my mast straight up. Tback and Brett Moss, among others, have suggested a little rake will help.

I've been too stubborn to try it. What do the rest of you think. "

Not having racing credentials my opinion may not be of interest, but I am one who likes the mast as far foreword as possible. Being on the light side and solo I find the limitation to rake is that when the wind blows white caps the bows will start digging in and I'm way back on the hull.

Two weeks ago I was lucky enough to be sailing with Andrew (and Elizabeth) and their Taipan 4.9. Northern New Mexico is stuck in a high pressure system this time of year and when the one storm cloud in four days arrived we were both out in the white caps. (I had rigged my fore stay into the second hole from the bottom.) I de-powered and was trying to go fast but the bow kept digging in. When the wind lightened a bit Andrew popped the spin and it was a race down to the east end of Heron Lake. Again the bows were diving, up to the beam in one instance, so he got way ahead. We ran out of lake and started tacking back but apparently there had been a wind shift as the chop was that of confused seas, maybe two feet, close together but not organized into waves, it was just chop. Every pitch foreword and aft broke the air flow and the boat went nowhere. So I'm there remembering, "get your weight on the center of the boat to reduce the pitching" i.e. main beam. So I'm there remembering something Matt M posted about the importance of hull speed and I'm laying off and moving foreword, I am thinking this is the condition where the Blade's hull design should outperform the Taipan but I can't get my weight (135 pounds) foreword enough to minimize the pitching because the pole is raked too far foreword and the bows keep digging into the water. Had there been less wind I could have gotten to the center of the boat and minimized the effect of the chop.

Pete, I don't know if this applies, but if you can't get to the center of the boat (length wise, buoyancy wise) because the bows are digging in then raking the mast back toward the rear is in order. Other wise, if it's light air try traveler out, at least a foot.