Wow- 19 posts including repostes in 1 day! (reposte as in fencing- with swords). The new M17 guys were showing off planing with chutes- going AS FAST AS POSSIBLE in 13 knots of breeze! I would have been doing the same thing- pedal to the metal.
ANd now- I gladly return the gesture- *SPLAT!*- (2 pounds of wet fish).

Never ever put monos and multis on the same course. They are not the same animal. We can't even get it right for all the different multi's we have.

Fine you don't like mono's... but a hell of lot of people do and they pay a insane amount of money for them and I'm kinda thinking they do it cause they don't suck.

So again, why do we find it necessary to dog out another group... Oh wait... I get it, its becuase they aren't like us.

Carry on.

Dave,

A few years back an E Scow sailor was speculating that if he had the right conditions, he could beat Daddio in the Mug Race. We sailed down that year and he launched from the Palatka marina and met up with us at the dog leg as we were approaching Palatka. Havinging sailed the 30+ nm we weren't interested in setting the chute on the light winded broad reach to the Holiday Inn. He saw us coming and did a 180. He set the chute and started drag racing us with his self given head start. It was comical for us(Charlie, Pam and me) to just sit on our butts and sail past them with just main and jib. Charlie and Pam never sat up and I only sat up to see where we were going and for the occasional trim of the main.

Needless to say the E Scow sailor never said a word about it again. That year it seems that we passed him the next day not far from the same place we passed him on the way down.

As Wouter alluded to, it is pure fantasy for a Melges 17 sailor to think he is faster than an A Class cat or for an E Scow sailor to think he can beat an RC-27. I would be really surprised if the fastest monohulls had performance curves that came close to most average catamarans under ideal conditions (for the monohull).

My hometown of Mobile, AL hosts the annual Dauphin Island Race which is billed as the largest one day regatta in the United States. They typically get between 300-400 boats to race from the north end of Mobile Bay approximately 18 miles south to Dauphin Island. There was an article about the race in 2004 in SAIL magazine.

There are typically two starts. The handicap (PHRF) monoslug classes go first at 9:00 AM. They are followed by the one design and Portsmouth classes 30 minutes later. There are typically anywhere from 15-25 beach cats racing this event every year. The race is typically a beat for the first 9 miles to Middle Bay Light and than a close reach for the next 9 miles from Middle Bay Light to the finish. This can be a race made for an A-cat!

I last raced it in 2004. The race started in a light southwesterly but there was an inversion keeping a much faster moving upper easterly gradient from mixing with the surface air. For the first 30 minutes after the start, I worked away from the classes in my start and sailed through the back end of the PHRF monoslugs as the breeze backed into the southeast and slowly started to pickup. Just as I broke through to the front of the PHRF fleet which consisted of two Olson 40s, an Oyster 40, and a One Design 35, the upper air broke through to the surface and the breeze picked up from 8-10 knots to 20-25 knots. All I had to do was drop the traveller 3", pull on the downhaul, and rotate the rig. The 35-40 foot monoslugs were on their ears as their crews tried to get reefs in their mains. The looks on the faces of the 12-15 sailors sitting on the sides of these boats as I ripped past them going higher and faster was priceless.

I was the first boat to cross the finish line followed a couple of minutes later by Mark Ederer and Steve Beal on Mark's Nacra 6.0 NA. You could not even see the the sails of the lead PHRF boats we had passed. They ended up finishing one hour behind us.

The next day in the local newspaper, they did not even mention that Mark and I were the first boats to the finish line. They only talked about the first monoslug, the Oyster 40 which was named "Tyrant" (oh please). At least the article in SAIL magazine gave us beach cats credit for getting there way ahead of everyone else.

Oh well, it was a very fun day of sailing and I'll do it again this year.

Bob Hodges
A2 USA 230

The only good thing about racing a mono is that someone hands you a sandwich at some point. And you get a better tan, my wetsuit tan isnt really working with the ladies.

get a life gents (lady seems pretty sussed !) , not even worth comparing cats to monos .
I race a lightweight single handed cat with kite for kicks , cruise a 32' keelboat with wife and kids , race a Tasar occaisonaly (with wife)Kids and I occaisonaly race on friends 40.7 and kids normally race a skiff (pointy type !) , I would never try and compare one to another .

oops nearly forgot the radio control lasers in the winter !

We should be grateful of the gr8 diversity of floating options we have rather than try picking holes in others.

Just my 2 groats .

Actually, I'm quite fine with monos. As I said, it's more important to get on the water. My wife doesn't feel that way, but that's fine because it enabled me to get the Corsair. After sailing that it will be way tough to go back if I ever have to.

I think when it comes to what you sail or drive, or live in, it needs to talk to you personally. So, get what you like. I spent a lot of years singlehanding the keelboat just to get out there. Lots of people love 'em for sure, and there's still few things as pretty as nicely designed mono with the rail in the water.

But, I think the reason the attitude that is seen from our side dogging the keelboaters is this - most of us have heard a lot of it directed at us from the keelboaters. So it's fun when we show them up on the water, and it's hard for people not to crow about it. Guaranteed if the other guys beat the cats they would crow about it.

A massive grasp of the obvious!
Who said a Melges 17 was faster than an A-Cat? I can't find that post.

My post suggested Dave find one of the experienced 17 skippers to compare boatspeed. Comparing boatspeed doesn't equate to saying "an M17 can beat an A-Cat". It means, uh, comparing boatspeed.

Sorry, didn't realize this was such a sensitive subject.

What are groats?

The name groat was given in the Middle Ages to all thick silver coins, as opposed to thin silver coins such as deniers or pennies. In about 1560 the word fourpence came to replace the word groat.

2 groats = 8 pennies = approx 3 pence = approx 5 US cents

Two groats! It used to be a "penny for your thoughts", then it went up to my "two cents worth"! Now it's a nickel!?

btw- one reason not to bad mouth monhulls, is that they might be disenclined to invite you back to their party. On the "Lake Eustis" site, I didn't see a lot of info. about cats.