I got first hand info from the parties who are (still) the plaintiffs.

Now I'm not saying that things happened this way intentionally, just that at one point no more boats were ever going to be shipped to him even if the builders were offered "what ever price" for their products ... (connect the dots yourself).


But Bill is right, it is better to focus on the initial questions.

Personally, I feel the HT class suffered very badly from over dependence on a single person and the total lost of trust in the class due to all the issues that surfaced at the time of the last planned Worrell 1000. It collapsed like the stock market is doing now; lost of trust meant that even good assets were regarded as devoid of value. The class has a problem right now that no boats are locally made or imported. The latter will not be corrected anytime soon with the US$ having taken a dive over the last few years and some builders having been burned.

Still, I'm sure the class can be revived if some volunteers set themselves to it. But like Bill says the boat has strong points and some serious weakpoints. The newer HT designs in Europe have gone some way in correcting these but these won't be making it to the USA. The US bim HT's (Jav-2's) is not a distance racer, the rearbeam slaps in chop, simple (italian) stuff like shackles break, it has got a mediocre rudder (kickup) system and it has bows that are easily overpowered (mainly lacks freeboard here). The newer HT's (in EU) are still not much of a Texel, Tybee, Worrell like distance racer but all other issues have been adressed. I must add here that Andreas does Texel with his HT's and does well indeed, but the numbers are simply against him especially when there are only short upwind legs and lots of wind.

With the spread in HT's over the nation I don't see much US HT's class racing getting of the ground, especially with the total number of imported boats. However, the boat is a capable open class bouy race in light winds and can be restarted that way. Will take alot of effort of a group of volunteers as they first have to live down the bad rep, but it can be done !

Wouter