I'll probably get flamed for this one in private but the simultanious development of the Capricorn and Blade is an interesting one.

Both were started at about the same time and both had mild access to eachother in the second halve of the development and non in the first halve. Both appear to be flyer copies but the differences are noticable. From discussion with both builders I formed the opinion that the flyer design is more a spiritual father than a practical one. Some of the difference are considerable. Flyer showed that significant improvements were possible even on the hulls of the late 90's after some 30 years of hull development. With this realisation both Martin Fisher/Greg Goodall and Phill Brander went to work on the respective hullshapes.

Martin apparently used alot of numerical computer models to design the hull shape and Phill Brander (not having access to such an approach nor the will to use one as well) used his past experience, idea's and scaled models.

For some reason both hull designs converged. And really both for their own reasons. I know that each alteration in the Blade shape had specific and well defined reasons. I assume the same happen with the Capricorn at least discussions with Greg Goodall leads me to believe so.

I also noticed that with discussions with both that sometimes they use completely difference physical models to explain the same feature. That is really weird. Phill uses basic force dynamics to explain some important parts of his hull shape and Greg refers to hydrodynamics when explaning the same feature.

From discussions with them it is also very clear that neither are copies one one or the other. One reason that leads me to believe this is that I know features that Phill incorporated first and features that the Capricorn had first. One particular aspect is the fact that Phill got the rocker position right the first. Greg walked a longer route and finally arrived at the about the same placement. Both reported the same improvements to me at different times.

It is really unbeleivable how both are working on their own ideas and to see how they take two, sometimes completely different, routes to reach very similar final boat behaviour and comparable shapes.

The two boats met on the waters few times and immediately went head to head on the upwind legs while leading the fleet. From this side 9F16) it was thrilling to witness. Sadly comparison on the downwind legs was troublesome as the F16 crew was arguably inferiour in spinnaker skills. The rule that Greg gave : "1 sec lost on a hoist or drop costs you 10 meters" is definately not overstated.

I talked to Daniel van Kerckhof (Very capable Taipan 4.9 sailors) just the other day. And his comments about the Capricorn reflect many comments of test sailors of the blade. The boat feels very smooth, very low drag, steers very well, very controlled. A pleasure to sail.

And especially upwind are reported to be the strong points of both boats.

I will take some risk here but I really think that both the Capricorn and Blade are progressing past the A-cat flyer example at this time. The Flyer itself is rather crude in his hull shape. Both the Capricorn and Blade are introducing more 3D shapes. Example. The Blade has some concave hullsides in the upper and forward part of the bow and the Capricorn has two minor hard chines at the sterns.

These guys are really doing some interesting stuff here. More comparable to what Tim Kirkham is doing with his new Object A-cat than the basic flyer shape.

Wouter