Darryl, VERY cool video!

Waldo came over the other day and I got to see it. Man, it was great seeing you gank that Nacra at the mark!

I just have to say, that there is no way my converted Hobie 14 or Mystere or any other converted 14 foot boat could compete with a boat like that. We have a few one-offs on the east Coast, but at any regatta that lets us sail F14, it is usually Hobie 14s with Hooter, Hobie Turbos, Waves with Hooter, and Mysteres. It is nice to have a class with different boats, but I just wouldn't be interested in sailing against a custom built boat with daggers and all the latest technical upgrades.

With that said, I think that the introduction of that kind of boat in the US would pretty much kill the current F14 class and everyone would want to run an open 14 class with their own Portsmouth. Now, if everyone had something like the Alpha, it would be different.

It would probably (at least) split the class in two. I'm not beign negative, but I'm just curious what other people think..

Hi Dan, glad you liked the video.
What has seemed to have evolved here with the Alpha F14 is that it hasn't had any real effect on the other 14' cats when it comes to racing. They still sail/race in their same divisions, courses etc as previous.
From the first time that we put the Alpha in the water it was obvious that it would be a "no contest" to sail with all other 14' cats, after all who wants to sail around a course completely on their own, that’s a very lonely place to be in, so we have always sailed at club level with the division one cats (Nacra 5.8's, A class, F18's, Taipans 4.9's, etc) and in that division we have experienced great competition. We haven't beaten the best of them over the line (yet, still, we live in hope) but we have always been well up with the top boats at the finish and never once felt "out of place". In fact competitively sailing a 14' cat against these larger cats and not crossing the line first, has been much more enjoyable than sailing against 14' and 16' cats and "blitzing" them every time.
So I don't think that there should be any "conflict" between any "state of the art" F14 and the other 14' cats, I think that the F14 will be automatically thought of as being in a completely different class. This doesn’t mean that at regattas, full on F14’s and existing 14’ cats that have been converted with spinnaker, hooter, etc, can’t compete over the same course. All it would take for that to be successful is for there to be ONE comparative handicap between the two “classes” (as opposed to multiple handicaps i.e. one for each individual make of cat) or as sometimes happens here we all sail the same course but the faster the class of cat, the more legs of the course they have to sail, not the most accurate way of determining a handicap difference, but damn good fun sailing.
You must remember that the whole concept of a “state of the art” Formula 14 is so that ANYONE, whether they be a company, a shipwright, a home builder, or just an enthusiastic sailer, can design and build their own F14 cat to within the “box rule”, and get out and sail without any handicapping against all other F14’s ON AN EQUAL BASIS for “across the line first wins”, that can only happen now if you sail a “one design” cat against the same one design cats, which, by it’s very nature, limits the number of cats racing for line honours against each other.
If the idea of F14 really catches on it will make for great racing, it just means that people have to stop talking about the cat that they could build that would be a “world beater” and get out there and do it, and a 14’ cat has to be the easiest and cheapest way of doing just that?
There are no secrets or “black art” in what makes the Alpha F14 perform as well as it does, nothing that any reasonably “handy” sailer couldn’t build himself or herself. Firstly the basic principles. Design an easily driven hull form with the greatest bouncy low in the hulls, MATCH the sail plan to the hull potential (don’t go for the greatest amount of sail possible, that has the effect of making the boat “perform” only in a very narrow range of conditions), don’t make the beam “over square” (the wider the beam the more downward pressure on the bows regardless of the mast step position fore and aft), step the mast approx’ central fore and aft, and for racing, there has to be centre boards. These are all pretty standard guidelines, but the thing that makes by far the greatest performance difference, particularly in a 14’ cat, is the weight. Any well designed 14' cat that has an all up weight under 85kgs will FLY!!