>>My first question is about the class itself. Is the F16HP Class international, or U.S.?
The class is international with 1/3 of the sailors reciding in the USA.
The hooter was debated in the beginning of the class in summer 2001 and the outcome is in the rules.
>> I cannot see that an answer has come forth on why Europeans do not consider a Hooter a headsail
They do consider it a headsail but just rated it in the same way they would do with a large jib. The shape and fact that it can be carried upwind are likely the causes of this. It behave differently than a spi or gennaker and is therefor naot rated as one by Texel and ISAF handicap systems.
>> But if it is considered a jib in the eyes of the F16HP Class, then there should be no reason .... sail a Taipan 4.9 with main and jib (only the jib would be a Hooter)
As long as the rated sailarea of such a sail is no more than 3,5 sq.mtr. (about 3,7 sq. mtr. actual area) you can indeed use such a sail in the F16 class.
>>... in essence, it is a ban if the unfair hit is so heavy that it cannot compete -- sounds like someone is scared as hell of such a sail design...
Not really, this is a typical result of historic decisions in the catsailing community. This resulted in the situation where F16's with hooters would be effectively not have a fighting chance to win races in EU because their class rating would be 15 % faster than that of the new Tornado sport and many of us don't see that happening. So allowing it could result for example in hooter boats in the USA and Gennaker boats in the EU and make a World Championship all but impossible. We alos wanted to have fairer handicap racing with respect to iF20 and Tornado spis; and equal racing to F18; the only way to achieve this is to have a comparable setup. Going for a hooter would not do that and only take us further away from our class goals we set in the beginning.
Just common sense.
>>The thing that has bothered me about the banning of the Hooter ... is how they can do so when the sail is smaller and even has a concave leech often
Either a 17,5 sq.mtr. hooter is faster than a 17,5 sq. mtr. gennaker or it isn't. If it is than disallowing it is fair to the NON US sailors and US sailors who own gennakers, as is becoming of a formula class. And if it isn't than there is no point in removing the girth rule as we'll all be sailing gennakers anyway.
>>Wouter says that the Hooter puts more load on the platform
No I didn't ; I just said that other people with hooter experienced told me it put alot of load on the boat. Peter Cogan for example sailed with one on his Taipan 5.7 in the Worrell 1000 of 1999 (I believe).
I say I have not nearly enough data to make any dependable analysis of it's performance. Hence my request to links pointing at hooter results.
>>Can anyone do the same for the spinnaker?
Yes, over the last 8 years spinnaker boats have taken 99 % of all the line honours in cat races world wide; non of the open design skiffs are using a screacher, hooter, reacher or similar of headsail. They all use very full broad shouldered spinnakers. And the 18 foot skiffs have even less rules than the A-cat. They only have two, boat may not be longer than 18 feet and races start sundays at 2 pm.
They only classes using reacher, screachers, hooters, code 0 - 2 are ocean going distance racing monohulls and multihulls. But then these boats do alot more reaching than cats and skiffs who typically race windward- leeward.
A long reply I know but I think it is important to show that F16 class decisions are based on logical arguments and serve a well defined purpose (the F16 class goals).
With kind regards,
