Shanklin Sailing Club

A boat designed to break the sail speed record was launched today from East Cowes. I think it could prove tricky to sail on one of our figure of eight courses at Shanklin.

Somehow I would rather a boat like Hydroptere beat the kite-surfers. This one seems a bit like cheating if it can't sail back. But good luck to them all the same.

http://www.sailrocket.com/

Just had a look at the sail speed records over the past 39 years on Wikipedia.

Over 500m the record for a sail craft has gone from 26.3 knots in 1972 on a windsurfer to 55.65 knots on a kite board last October, with Hydroptere not far behind on 51.36 knots over the distance. You could do 26.3 knots on less than a grand's worth of sail board and rig now.

I think the most amazing stat is the trimaran Banque Populaire V averaging 37.84 over 24 hours.

That is one weird machine! Anyone GPSed a Dart 15 for max speed?

mckenna789 wrote:That is one weird machine! Anyone GPSed a Dart 15 for max speed?

I got 15.6 knots on a beam reach with just the main. I think you would get towards 20 in sport mode on a trapeze in flat water and a constant F5 or 6.