It is indeed great to see the Sailing world magazine to choose a high performance catamaran as their boat of the year. That is good promo for all cat sailors in a mono minded sailing world.

Thanks F18HT class.

And like all the others have said earlier. Different people choose different boats for different reasons and so did I.

I owned both 16 and 18 ft. boats and my latest boat of preference will once again be a 16 foot boat.

I 'm not 50 yet or have smaller children so that weren't the reasons for me to choose a 16 footer.

Mine are that my permanent and very committed crew got hooked on some women who demanded that he moved away from the seaboard to live with her. And in the contest between women and the sea, the sea lost out. Since then "time-share" between sailing/racing solo and sailling/racing doublehanded. I have a busy schedule in my work in the energy sector of the NL (Daily deadlines work) and often aren't able to schedule a race till the very last moment. This makes finding a crew extra difficult and I don't always succeed. By going F16 I can decide how to sail (solo or not) till a few minutes before the race.

Added to this the fact that have began to hate dragging up a heavy boat through the soft sands we have here and onto a roadtrailer, especially alone. Making my happy again required going trully light weight. And well you don't get much lighter than an A-cat, M20 or F16.

I really looked at A's but I enjoying sailing doublehanded under a full rig to much to immediately decide for that boat. Also I like taking people along for a ride. This dropped the A-cat. And for some reason my girlfriends are in the featherweight range. A big powerful boat would scare them away from the sport I love dearly.

M20 was to expensice for me and to extreme; I would be scared shitless sailing or even racing that boat singlehanded in Dutch conditions. So I was faced with a problem because I didn't like the heavy 16 footers of the time; almost teh same weight as a 18 footer by significantly slower. I don't see tnhe point in going slow because some builders doesn't want to optimize a 16 footer. Than the Taipan 4.9 design come along as a shining beacon as well comparable 16 foot designs by other builders and I thought :"That is the boat that will fill all requirements for me and I guess for many others like me too 1" And so my Formula 16 was born.

It is the only cat class that satisfies MY needs.

And after this all I thought that many others formulated needs to come out at the same designs and this the class was born and has grows consistently ever since.

Fair winds to you all,

Wouter