Most of the sailors that I've spoken with that had sailed the Bimare 18HT's in the inaugural Tybee500 identified several weaknesses in the boat design when it comes to offshore sailing and were not interested in doing it again with the same boat. I've had a couple of days of experience with my Nacra F18 in 4' steep swell and 18knots that gave me indication that I might desire a little more hull volume in the bows if I had to try and reach in those conditions. With the spinnaker up, the boat had to be driven much more conservatively than one would with, for instance, an I-20. Basically, the F18 has proven to be a lot more tender in heavy wind and seas with the spinnaker. Upwind in those conditions, however, the boat is a ferocious animal!

Another area that has my interest is the height of the rear beam. Even the I20 experiences rear beam slap when sailing in a quartering sea. It's hard to express how violent and surprising this event is when sailing with 18 to 20knots of boat speed. At times, the rear beam on the I20 would smack a wave launching the back of the boat suddenly skyward. The added pressure on the bow would usually cause it to dive into the next wave. It's like riding a bucking bronco while someone quickly floors the accelerator and then the brake by surprise! The rear beam on the F18 appears to also be quite low to the water as well and a rear beam slap coupled with the narrow bows could be a handful if rear beam clearance is an issue.

HOWEVER - please don't interpret my comments as negativity toward the boat. I am still absolutely thrilled with my boat...but I also accept that it was optimized for windward leeward racing with focus for the upwind leg. I am also not ruling out doing the Tybee, OBX, or Atlantic 1000 on it (we're still discussing our plans for 2006). In the next year, Team Seacats will be testing the limits of the boat (we have two Nacra F18s now) in various conditions to see if we will personally feel comfortable putting ourselves and the boat through a race like that. We’re starting with the Steeplechase this weekend. Can it be done? Undoubtedly! The only question is whether or not we would enjoy the race.