billrob

Your arguement leaves out the rear beam slap factor. When a lightweight, tall rig boat, like the HT (or a modified 2 man A cat with a spin) is sailing in chop downwind the rear beam will hit the chop and cause the boat to pitch forward. Read Bob's discussion above, he witnessed this in action. The PUR boat was pitching in the chop and the crew had a hard time staying on board. If the boat is slapping and pitching in the waves, you are slowing the boat dramatically and if the crew doesnt have his wits about him, he will get thrown forward and then you are swimming. So your arguement is flawed unless you have flat water, which usually doesnt happen with higher winds.

A two man spin boat needs more freeboard, not less. The rear beam needs to be up out of the chop. Most the HT's have raised the rear beam and this solved the problem.

So I would argue that a wider hull - like the Bimare HT Hull would work better than a finer hull in practice.

Bill