I think I understand where you are coming from Tony and as a European Fleet there are very few of us who actively attend the bigger regattas to firmly promote the Class and excellent qualities of the boat. This in turn is having a detrimental effect on demand figures.
However, like most Cat Clubs out of the majority in your case of 500 Cats I'm sure that only a tiny percentage are less than 5yrs old and the vast majority are decaying Pringles, Inters/NACRA's & Tigers which rarely race and seldom travel. So to have two fairly new F16's is pretty good.
I'm not totally convinced about an average 140kg F18 team being very competitive in all conditions and aspects of racing but that's another debate;-). Also, as much as I liked the FX One the idea of attempting to right the boat post capsize was a real turn off. So in my case there was something wrong with the product.
Anyway, I will agree with you if we are not careful here in Europe we could be seen as the Wednesday night joy riders but as long as the numbers increase as they have been doing so for the past 6yrs and the camaraderie of the fleet still remains then I'm happy with this label.