JG wrote:
And the cat did about the same, perhaps even faster in 10 knots.

I doubt it. It sounds like the cat you chartered had pretty good
performance, but no charter boat is going to hit 0.9X true wind speed
close hauled. The heavy sails just aren't up to it, for one thing.

My point is not that cats are slow (that would be dumb) but that *fast*
monos are faster than non-racers are going to believe. There are 30
footers that rate less than 50 PHRF... yet a 40 foot racer-cruiser that
rates 100 is considered "fast" by many and the cruising cat sailors brag
about pulling away from such a one.

For example, our Johnson 18 can beat beach cats much of the time. The
only point of sail cats have an advantage is close reaching, when we
can't set the spinnaker and can't take advantage of outpointing them.
They also go better through a chop.

The big advantages to a cruising cat IMHO are the lack of heel, shallow
draft, and the greater elbow room per LOA. If you want speed, a cruising
cat is not at the top of the list. It'd be interesting to see how some
of the custom cats perform when outfitted for cruising.

... I believe
the first picture (of the instrument panel) was taken in about 10 knots of
wind, pretty much on a downwind course. We saw 9+ kts in 11 kts wind
regularly when close hauled, but could never really point quite as high as
the monos. I didn't see any Express boat out there. We most saw Beneteaus.


'Cosmic Warlord' is the Bitter End's Express 37. It's not really tricked
out but they do have good sails and it has no furniture. It's pretty
darn fast- they rate around 70 PHRF in cruising trim. When we had it
really going we were too busy to look at the speedo. I saw mid-teens a
bunch of times including under white sails. It's one of those boats
that's difficult to surf because it goes faster than the waves, keeps
sticking it's nose in the wave in front.

Fresh Breezes- Doug King