Very nice, Bob, except that I, chugging along on my Wave, have no way of knowing whether this spinnaker boat coming at me at warp speed even sees me, much less knows the rules (which is even more a concern after reading some of the posts lately). I have been thinking about taking an air horn on my boat to give a sound signal to let them know I am there.

Back in the mid 1970's my family was at Miami Yacht Club for the MidWinter Championships. My father and I were sailing a 16-foot Sizzler at the regatta (since I worked for that company at the time). It was a a breezy day, typical of the area, probably 15-knot wind. We were on our way out to the course at the beginning of the first day. All the boats had to tack out get out to the starting line. We were on starboard tack when all of a sudden a Tornado came out of nowhere on port tack and climbed aboard. We had yelled "starboard," but he did not hear us. His port hull came onto our deck right beside my father and undoubtedly would have killed him if it had hit him. The Tornado's starboard hull broke our port rudder off.

The Tornado sailor was from Canada and was campaigning for the Olympics at the time. So one would think he was an experienced sailor.

As he was shoving his boat off ours, he just said, "I didn't see you," as though it was our fault that he didn't see us. Never even said he was sorry. (And that was just a main and jib situation.)

So please forgive me if I do not trust anybody to see me, regardless of how experienced they are.

And, unfortunately, some people (who can afford it) when they first get a catamaran decide they might as well just start out with the biggest and the fastest. It's a recipe for disaster, either for themselves or for others around them.