Posted by Laurence Monkhouse on February 12, 2004 at 08:06:02 from 217.137.106.42 user Laurence_.
In Reply to: Re: Young Sailors posted by Alasdair on February 11, 2004 at 22:07:41:
Off the wind Amazon was certainly faster. But in the close hauled section in the race in SD from Wild Cat Island to Beckfoot Swallow caught up and overtook from a position a long way behind at the lee mark. And it is close hauled work which is usually considered to be the best test of a boat. On that basis Swallow was the better boat.
Mavis/Amazon - hull and rig - looks a very strange shape to modern eyes and I will blasphemously say that I don't think she would have been very pleasant to sail. Cocky however, which I sailed at the AGM last year, is pleasant and easy to sail and is a very good boat, albeit heavy and a bit undercanvassed. As she is Scarab, and the boatbuilder claimed that Scarab was a close reproduction of Amazon, she must be like the Amazon AR imagined.
But the centreplate is heavy and awkward and so as there seems to have been little to choose between them in overall performance then I stick to my preference for Swallow