top speed 40 knots just sounds like bad marketing to me. in sales it's best to be a vague as possible. limiting the abilities of the boat with the words top speed doesn't make much sense.
they said in the brasil article that the boats were at peak performance in something like 15 knots of wind, so the boats obviously are not really made for sailing comfortably in the kind of winds that you would need to go 40 knots. if you weren't on a speed course you would need to be in some radical open ocean stuff surfing down a giant wave to go 40. somehow i doubt they race those things like that. i have my doubts that they would ever hit 40 even at maalaea where we have pretty flat offshore conditions with sick high winds all summer long.

question- why isn't there a speed division of cat sailing? if i made a speed sailing cat it would have deep v hulls similar to a gcat or sizzler.-that statement should start a controversy, but i really think that's a fast shape.