Thanks for a pretty balanced post Gilo.

I have been thinking along the same lines with a shockcord system you can tension with your feet up while going upwind/downwind. Once you decide to hoist/douse, release the shockcord with a spinlock and *swoosh* the spi is flying.
What would stop the 2-up crews from implementing the same "stored energy" hoist and retrieval systems and thus nullify the advantage?