Sailed quite a lot both single handed and with crew.

Have to admit I slightly underestimated Spi-sailing especially alone. But great fun: "match racing" to identical H16 with spi.

However I'm a little amazed to read Pauls comment about loads of lift. I would merely say the tendency to dive has decreased (a little). Sailing with crew we'll have a crew weight of approx 180 kgs so buyancy is critical.

Light wind with a sudden windblow made rudders effectless so we flipped.

Sailing single handed its quite a mess on the tramp. Short of time and hands of course. Should be able to get better control when in trapeze but did not dare yet.. No way to fix myself against being thrown to the bow (when diving) or to the aft (waves !!) How do you guys cope with that ? Thinking about adding foot strap(s) rather than a line. Security matter: don't want to be drown being slept behind my own cat somehow...

Last weekend we practised ± 18-20 kn wind with crew. Experienced same challenges: sudden gale gave hardly any lift. Might as well we need to move our weight more to the aft but with unsteady wind very uncertain condition. Also short but steep waves demanded special attention. Dived more than once till the water almost reached the front crossbar ! Just managed to avoid flipping over ...

Fellow catsailors on F18 standing in trapeze at the utmost aft position passing by "effortless" ..

A pole length of 3,5 m' is recommended earlier. Ours is only just 3,1 m'. Also compared with F18 spi (21 m2) ours is smaller (17 m2) Could that make substantial difference in bow lift ?

Keep you posted ! And any suggestions / advice ?
Please do. Some previous comments seem to indicate you are spi-sailing alone with far less control problems ?