Everybody,


I'm feel compelled to inform a few of us here that myths, no matter how often repeated, are still not truths.

While some builders will ask 1500 US$ for a pair of daggerboards (marstrom ?) the F16 builders most definately do not ! At least my own AHPC daggerboards were 350 Euro's for the pair or about 420 US$

Also the myth boat par excellence is the Hobie 16. Here in Europe a new (and complete) H16 will cost about 13.000 Euro's. There is a cheaper Hobie 16 but it lacks all kinds of stuff like the second trapeze and such. An excellent F16 with a good number of full carbon bits is the Stealth F16 which can be bought for 8000 british pounds or roughly 12.500 Euro's.

So if the new Hobie 16 is an entry boat dus to its low cost price then so too is the Stealth F16.

I do agree however that in the way of performance and handling the F16's are not entry level boats. They are however entry level boats for RACING. The latter does assume the sailors gained skills and experience prior on other boats.

Personally I believe the only true entry level boats are older second hand H16's, P16's, N5.0's and Waves. These can be bought for a few thousant dollars or Euro (or cheaper) and are well suited to learn the basic sailing and racing skills that will prepare the crews for true race oriented designs like the F18's, A's, F16's and such.

Having said this I'm happy to see a more lively second hand market for F16's develop; were F16's can be purchased for as little as 5000-7000 as well.

In my opinion no boat can be both "cheap entry level" and race oriented. So F16 positioned itself as the next best thing that was achievable "Entry level racing boat". However it is this mostly in the field of cost as the skills needed for the handling are further removed from boats like waves etc. But then again skills can be learned, financial burdens are harder to overcome.

Wouter