European Bloke

We had one of those on a new to us race yacht years ago. First sail we pushed off from the dock and jumped aboard and not a lot happened. We all looked at each other, then the owner, who was doing this sort of meerkat thing, up and down from the engine controls. Someone suggested that now might be a good time for some engine considering the fresh breeze, there was a bit more meerkat and then some swearing from the owner. Fortunately as a race boat she was quite light, and we had quite a lot of bodies onboard, so we could quite easily hold her off the yachts moored to leeward and then put her back somewhere more sensible. As a recall a bit of brute force and some WD40 and she was all good. Not that we ever trusted it, or the owner, again.

Shimano and SRAM aren't too bad, bloody Campy are a nightmare. It might be Gucci Italian kit but it's a fucking disaster to fix. That said everyone I know who rides Campy wouldn't recognise a hammer, let alone a torx bit, it all goes to the shop so it's not really a problem to them. Oh, and every Campy specific tool you need costs 6 times what's reasonable. Bastards.

Sounds like an excellent was of putting your wife off sailing, and possible speaking to you, ever again.

Possible, but I think it's more likely that a modelling assumption was just plain wrong. This whole thing is so completely different they just don't know. Either that or it was built wrong, or they hit something. WTF do we know...

His crew sound like they deserve him too.

The only issue with that is making sure that none of the holes in any of your stanchions have any gnarly bits. After that I like the idea.

I wonder if taking the sail cover off the main would have helped him go upwind? I guess we'll never know now.

My father in law won't sail without his dogs. He took the almost criminal approach of covering cabin sole in carpet tiles. I hate it, getting into the bilge is a nightmare, but the dogs are happy, he's happy and so is the sole. On deck everything is plastic, and the dog slides around like Bambi on ice, actually it usually just sits on it's arse...

I got blisters similar to that in my painted deck under the cover. It was a breathable polycotton, but still obviously held moisture. Once the cover was removed the blisters disappeared after a couple of weeks of good weather. They may return, who knows...

What we really crave is this race to start so we can see who actually got their shit straight.

That's not just an excavator, that's a full on demolition machine with a nibbler for taking apart reinforced concrete. Makes me feel physically sick looking at that picture.

I was trying to work out how to write this yesterday, but Gouv has done it much better.

The top quality fun arrives when it's time for the 3rd, and you need the line out of the 1st to be removed and re-lead. At which point it's getting quite rough for gymnastics, and at least half the crew are no use because they're busy feeding the fish.

Well even the aRSe salesman described the 21 to me as a shitter for old geezers... However I understand the point you're trying to make. I believe that model one will continue indefinitely. When the old guy first buys his boat he doesn't realise he's an old guy, he still thinks that he's a young guy who's made his money quick enough to buy a boat and still be involved.