well its official the nacra17's are here we just took a shipment here at KeySailing in Pensacola. Cant wait to get one on the water

Charlie, that is great news. At Candler we rated the boat same as the F 18 - 62.4. I am sure the Texel rating will be coming soon. One leg the F18 would round first, and for the next weather mark rounding the N 17 would prevail. They appear fast downwind, that is for sure.

So how many are stateside? What events will they be doing? Any chance they'll be racing outside the Olympic circle?

Robbie and Taylor raced N 17s this past weekend. Check out the Candler site for the elapsed times. Kirk's shipment is evaporating by the day. Want one? Give him a call soon.

Want one? Sure, if they're free!
Robbie and Taylor are both attempting Olympic campaigns.
Yes the boats are fast but so are Robbie and Taylor, they likely would have been first on a F18.
How many boats are going to non-Olympians?

Please don't get me wrong the N17 has a lot of appeal to me given our current crew weight and makeup (mixed) fits the bill perfectly for a N17. Just doesn't make sense with our regatta schedule and certainly not happening this year. We don't have time to run an Olympic campaign and keep our day jobs, I know how much training those teams are doing.

I look at the N17's as being half baked... Not quite optimized for the inclusion of curved foils. A cats have been driven by lots of designers optimizing the curved boards shape, location, etc etc and now they are landing on a solution of curved boards and T foils on the rudders. (They can't use the AC foil designs legally) The N17 is frozen in time as an Olympic class.

For Olympics... it won't be an issue... since the class is so tightly controlled (can't even move cleats) that the sailors will stand on their ear if need be to max the boats performance..

For the US rec racer... There are lots of questions.. Where do you race this boat? The Olympic class must be of mixed teams... so most rec racers would have trouble forming a team in this class. You can count on a Miami OCR regatta and a North Americans in this class.... So, is that enough racing to warrant 25K for a boat? Set aside the gran prix circuit... Do you continually tweak the N17 or upgrade it like the Nacra carbon 20 or the A class to optimize it? Does the boat draw in new racers from keel boats or other dinghy classes... and or does it cannibalize the F18 fleet? What happens when the Flying Phantom is produced for consumers and boats now fly but N17's don't?

I could see a life for the boat IF we had a North American SCHRS Handicap class schedule of events for these new designs that won't get a critical mass for one design. The gearheads and folks that demand to be cutting edge would have events to go to... beyond some distance races. Mix in some sailors with one design boats who slum it in open class and you would have a viable national circuit that would make the boat a viable race boat.

Help me out seeing the future of this boat. Is there a NA class president / class association?

Mark,you better spend some time in Florida.

The spread in availability will gradually increase east of the Mississippi through the remainder of this year.

The F 18 and F 16 Classes will continue to hold their own until those boats grow tired, and my guess is they will be replaced with NACRA 17s as time goes on by the wanna - be foilers. I am wondering if the boat is too heavy for lifting foils and rudder 'wings.' Jake you there for comment on this?

Rudder stabilizers are the hot trend now for the A Cats with curved foils. Let's hope NACRA considers this in short time.

For this year - take good care of your F 18 sails and trailer.

This is funny. A new Olympic boat jumps on the market and now the demise of the Formula rule boats that we've grown to love for a myriad of reasons (#1 is it ISN'T SMOD) is predicted?

Where's the big F20c fleet?

nope. They had to peel the N20 tiller out of my hand. The same thing will happen with my F18. Dang boats are too expensive anymore to keep chasing the latest and greatest...added to which, I already feel like the F18 is too short. Well...I guess I did comment.

The 17 is fine - but competition is a real issue for me. I don't have anyway to put a mixed team together nor do I care to boot my now regular crew to the curb. Even if they would create rules where mixed crew weren't the case, at 370, we're marginal to compete on an F18 let alone a shorter boat. I'll admire them, but it's unlikely that I'll ever buy one.

Nacra has nothing more to say about the N17... it is SMOD but it is now regulated by ISAF for the Olympics. Nothing is changing on that boat till after the 2016 games.

SMOD seems kind of retro... the only other International cat class that is SMOD and in production is the Hobie 16.

So... all you have is Florida is leading the country? I just don't see it.

I like SMOD. Not popular here, but I still prefer it. I respect formula and like all racing, but prefer SMOD. There tends to be less blaming of the boat (or rating) in SMOD racing.

Mike

The US Class bylaws are drafted and they're moving toward appointing officers. This is how the F18s got started back in 2005 - volunteers drafted bylaws, adopted them by consent and the first officers were appointed.

You don't necessarily have to boot your crew, medical research has come a long way you know.

Dont really have an opinion on the N17, its a tool for the Olympic path but I don't think many people will leave their trusted F16/F18 fleets behind just yet.
As 2nd hand boats come available there could be some people who pick one up but unless you have the skills to compete at worldcup level you will just be sailing on handicap.
IMHO the 2nd hand boats sailed by the current teams will be pretty worn out though considering how much TOW they get.

The mixed sailing is cool though and good to see that it is growing in F18 as well (one third of the teams at our last major regatta where mixed).

I heard some reports from a couple of teams who went to the Olympic training camp in Miami. A few youth teams on F16 went and sailed with some of the Olympic 17 teams. While the boat is new and there was not a lot of head to head time, the 16s appeared faster or at least as fast, especially downwind in the conditions where they were lining up together.

The 17s were thrown together to provide a submission for selection as the Olympic boat. Anything wrong with them cannot be changed and the boat will remain unoptimized for the next 3+ years at least. The Olympic teams sailing them will spend huge amounts of time and money to make these boats go as fast as possible. As far as a rating goes it will be driven by the world class sailors competing for an Olympic medal. Your weekend warrior buying one of these is not going to compete with the top guys and no way will be able to drive the boat to the numbers that are going to be given to the boat because of the top guys.

Maybe long term, there will end up being enough used boats coming from the teams to field a fleet of “regular” sailors. In the short term this looks to be a very expensive disappointment if you think you can buy one and actually compete.

Geebus Bert you really don't like the F18 class do you. When your grandson got involved with the F16 you said almost the exact same thing about the F16 replacing the F18 along with MANY others yet here we are still chugging along with our little piggies.

The N17 is exactly what it was built for... an olympic platform which is demanding to sail and difficult to perfect. Many of those making a run at it will run out of time, money or discover they just don't have the skillset to compete at the olympic level and the N17 will be just like the T-class where the difference between the have's and have not's is dramatic and the have's is a small pool.

Sorry Bert, I think the F18 and F16 classes will be just fine and if we do come apart it will be of our own doing and not because of the N17.

For Portsmouth Racing you have a point... the basic assumption for the handicap system is violated... all fleets are equally skilled. ergo... garbage in... garbage out

SCHRS and Texel handicaps are based on measurements.... The current state of the art is trying to understand how much curved foils change things... Of course.. if you or your builder badly execute the curved foils in your design.. your boat will be a dog... the measurement rating formula has no chance to be accurate (for the dog) and rate the high performer

Keep in mind that there is only so much accuracy that can be had with handicap racing and there is a lot of noise in sailboat race data.

I am surprised at how little buzz there is about the N17 kicking butt on the F16 and the F18 fleets in xxx regatta.

Maybe that's true but it's think it way to early to declare the F16 faster, the boats sail completely differently. Upwind and off the starting line the N17 is screwed. Find one on the line and make it your best friend regardless of who is sailing it. Don't feel bad for them, they will pay you back once they round 'A' mark.

SCHRS and Texel are just another convoluted method to try and form some basis to compare boats. Yes there is a measurement system in place, but the calculation is manipulated by people to try and make the output correction factor match what is happening at events. In other words, the calulator is just BS covering up peoples manipulation of the system and has no more relavance than Portsmouth or any other system.

I too have to call bullsh!t on the SCHRS measurement system! Mark please explain how a measurement system made the F16 slower and the F18 faster. Since the F16 and F18 are following almost the exact same development path is SCHRS saying that a heavy boat is actually faster? Really?

Handicap racing has it's place but it's NEVER going to have any real credablity.

That saved me a bit of typing.