Confession: I did not bother to tune in to the last Americas Cup. Yep. Rather roll in poison ivy than endorse that billionaires game gone awry. Besides, even if I were paying attention, no coverage materialized on my bargain cable service.
Sure, I admire the engineering feats and sailing expertise that went into the contenders as much as the next water rat, but if it takes a team of lawyers to wrangle over the meanings of “constructed” just to stage a sailboat race, Im gone. Sure would like a ride on one of those machines though . . . (sigh).
Onward.
With eight pages on multihulls beginning on page 8, this months mag could be regarded as the make-amends issue of Practical Sailor. In the September 2009 issue, we profiled a few new monohulls and had the nerve to call them fast. Im still fielding e-mails from mortified multihull fans. In an effort to clear the inbox, Ill cut to the chase: Two hulls are better than one!! (Alright, two Stiletto owners put me up to that one, but there is a vein of truth in there.)
Honestly, I am huge fan of go-fast cats and tris, and I think the whole multi-versus-mono kerfuffle is largely fueled by marketing campaigns from both sides. As John Spier, who recounts his familys circumnavigation aboard an Outremer 45 catamaran (page 14) puts it, “Were all sailors.”
No matter how many hulls you have on your own chosen craft, I doubt many among us wouldnt relish a fast reach on one of the multihulls featured this month. In fact, Ill bet for many PS readers, their passion for sailing could be traced back to that surge of adrenaline upon lift-off aboard one of Hobie Alters early creations. Thats my story: a life-altering pocket of air between the windward ama of a Hobie 18 and the sparkling shards of Biscayne Bay, Fla.
The hardest part of tackling this subject was trying decide where to start. Personally, Im a fan of James Wharrams Polynesian-inspired catamarans, no-frills cruisers that practice Aikido with the waves of the Pacific. Ultimately, our focus on the raw exhilaration of sailing speed led us away from the cruising boat market to smaller, nimbler craft.
The boats we settled on are a small cross-section of whats available, but they aptly capture the spirit of the current trends. When you regard the wind and waves as distant echoes from that first Big Bang, then multihull boats-as the Polynesians discovered centuries ago-are more than just a means of getting where we need to go, they stir our very soul.
