Mark, you have hit a big sore spot with me when you even mention the Hobie 18 SX, and its history. I don't think Matt Miller was around back when the SX started, but I was.

I think it was back in the late 1980's (early 1990's?) when the Hobie 18 was still the biggest one-design cat class in the country next to the Hobie 16.

We went to the Hobie 18 Nationals in Erie, Pennsylvania. The factory was providing the boats. When we got there, we found out that it was not a Hobie 18. This was their way of introducing the Hobie 18 SX. SURPRISE!!

The boats had the bigger sail plan but did not have the wings on them for this introductory regatta. Apparently, the sailors were being used as guinea pigs to test this new sail plan. Whatever the factory was thinking, it certainly was not a Hobie 18 Nationals. Nobody had ever sailed the boat with that sail plan before.

Fortunately, I was not crewing, but I was watching from a cliff overlooking the bay when the boats first went out to race. I watched all the boats capsizing everywhere.

This was a class that had mostly male-female crews. This event was devastating because nobody knew until they arrived that they were going to have a bigger-horsepower "motor" on their boats.

So much for the benefit of sailing and getting to know a one-design boat for 10 years. I guess that is what can happen when the factory is in control.

You don't experiment by introducing a new model or version or whatever at a National Championship. You do surprises like that at the Alter Cup so nobody has had any experience in sailing the boat or sail plan before.