We must also not forget that the course these C-class boats sailed is defined in detail and it contains a disportionally small amount of deep leeward sailing.

From memory it contained a single deep triangle course with a wind-leeward loop at the end. And I think it even had an upwind finish. Basically there is no reaching involved and on the first lap (triangle) you are forced to sail no lower then 120 degrees off the wind to make the B-mark.

Sloop rigs and especially spinnaker rigs will beat downwind between 135 degrees and 150 degrees depending on the wind conditions.

The pure downind leg on the C-class course is negligiable as it is now only 1/6th of the total distance sailed; on our windward-leeward courses this is 1/2 the distance sailed.

Such a course actively prevents any rig that can sail deep and fast from being competitive. Even more so as it makes the pure upwind leg by far the most dominant part of the race. Of the 3 courses sailed : pure upwind, 120 degrees broad reach and pure downwind, the upwind leg is three times as large as the downwind leg and also 1.5 times larger then the 120 degree broad reaching.

Here we see another example of how class rules may well implicetly favour one setup over another. I remember from the miss nylex article that its design team based a good portion of their design choices on the fact that the upwind leg was made so much more dominant by the defined C-class race course. I think they decided against having 2 slots for this reason.

Wouter