I see lets forget about the mono minded portion of the sailing world, they will never learn.

Last summer the crew I was part of sailed a cruising multihull (in a 24 hours race with 500 boats competing) to a first place in our small class but ALSO to something like 3rd overall on handicap over ALL classes. As it was a very large cruising multihull with a jacuzi on board with did so with a rather modest amount of sailed miles. When it was our turn to pick up our price a guy right behind said relatively loudly "and that is why you shouldn't get one of those floats".

Later in the day we saw him reinstall the toilet, the sink, the **** apparatus and a whole lot of other stuff he took out to gain speed for the race. We were sailing with 500 liters of water in out tank and 650 liters of diesel oil and duting the night we had all kinds of warm snacks to keep us warm and comfi. This monohull guy, despite leaning all night long on his trimmed down hot rod still lost from us while we were sailing a bloody caravan in 5 knots of wind from our deck chairs. Yeah that is one more reason why not to get a catamaran alright !

They will never learn.

With respect to skiffs. Yes they are spectacular, but they are also bloody hard to handle. Small wonder why it is not taking off in the wider world. Skiff sailing is just one big promo adventure. Does anyone else notice that all the footage of skiffs is 95 % under spinnaker ? That is because they are bloody slow ( = boring) upwind. Especially in the ludicrous light wind venues that the summer games always seem to select. Watching skiffies do their thing in 4 knots of wind is pretty close to watching a DVD course and ballet (balancing on their toes). No planing in those conditions !

And yes I feel windsurfing has got dealt a bad hand again as well. Have these guys sail in some decent breeze and you'll get a spectacle.

Maybe this is one of those times were cat sailing and surfer just need to break loose and do their own thing. I for one do not really see the olympics as sustaining much of the catsailing scene we have now.

Wouter