One more comment
The A's are a very refined beast and hence getting less and less frontal area ( wind drag ) will give them better and better performance.
I've started to feel that the best qualification of the A's is that they are uphill beasts and downhill dogs with their average over both legs (overall performance) being pretty normal.
Of course the first upwind leg with the start is very important for the overall result and this is driving all the advances in uphill speed even at the expensive of downhill performance. That is a given and also the main argument to not look at the A's for guidance on all things related to catamaran design.
In open class racing they are not king of the hill any more and haven't been for a while (over the full spectrum of conditions). They have excellent racing in their own class because all suffer under the same limits as is the same principle that levels the Hobie 16 playing field. Yet there is no designer who looks at the H16 for guidance on how to design a proper catamaran.
Of course this is with all due respect to our A-cat friends and the A-cat class as a whole.
Wouter
