Keep telling yourself otherwise, but a full carbon-epoxy boat will outlast the glass equivalent. Performance wise? It probably doesn't matter straight out of the box. As far as F16 vs. F18, everyone has their choice for a reason. I think the F16 is a great boat, but here in the real-world the F16 will pitch pole first, is slower through short chop, and has yet to show us better performance in light air, so I'll continue sailing our overweight F18. Where the F16 really shines is in the versatility (sort of, 2-up is faster), and getting it up the ramp at the end of the day. As to size, we feel cramped on the Blade. Will give a Falcon or Viper a go and see what we think, but the hulls are MUCH smaller than the Infusion hulls so again, we are more forgiving to drive and faster when the wave state builds. Plus we are a little heavy for the F16, at 310lbs dry. Finally, we have an America's championship regatta with teams flying in from Europe and South America to compete against, plus Catacup, plus a highly competitive NE fleet. We are learning a lot at a very rapid pace in the F18 and I just don't think it's possible in the F16 right now in North America.

All of this wasn't my point to begin with in this thread; my point was a striker less beam can be built, total platform weight can be kept to class rules minimums, and a stiffer platform can be achieved (UHM carbon is MUCH stiffer than aluminum). Would a carbon striker on a carbon beam be the stiffest solution at the least weight? Absolutely. But that wasn't the question. Strikerless can be done.