My cronies are beginning to whine. “What happened to the boats you could race or cruise with your family? 

But to me as a designer I like to see just how far design elements can be pushed before the boat explodes. I like innovative features like foils. There is no question that there is a trickle-down effect from racing to cruising. Will foils trickle down? Who knows. I would not rule it out. Carbon rigs, once seen only on the top level racing boats, are now common place on high-end cruising boats.

The successful ClubSwan series of boats was initiated four models ago. This time Swan has gone to Juan Kouyoumdjian for the design. The office is simply called Juan Yacht Design. Juan is known for his radical and often very effective approach to racing design classes. 

The specs list the DWL as 36 feet and the LOA as 34 feet 5 inches. So the waterline is greater than LOA. It might be better to think of LOA as LOD or Length on Deck. The strong reverse on the stem reduces LOD. Topsides are shaped and radiused at the sheer to reduce windage, pretty much eliminating what we think of as a sheerline. But an implied sheer is a reverse sheer that further reduces windage. The L/B is 3.05 and the D/L is 62.1. The keel fin is just there to hold the 3,800-pound bulb for a 47% ballast-to-displacement ratio. Max beam is carried aft with almost no taper. From what I can tell there is one foil that will manually slide from one side to the other as required to provide both lift and resistance to leeway. The rig is unusual in that it is a deck-stepped mast with almost no sweep to the single spreaders. This will allow for a huge amount of rig geometry control. Swan calls it a “soft rig.” The mast base is adjustable to give a lot of options for mast bend. I don’t have any numbers for the rig but if I were to guess I would say we are looking at an SA/D well above 35.

I will watch this exciting class with keen interest.

Our best estimate of the sailaway price:  $452,000

LOA 34’5”; LWL 36’; Displ. 5,512 lbs. Ballast 3,800 lbs.; L/B 3.05; D/L 62.1; SA/D 35

ClubSwan

Borgo Ss Apostoli, 27

Florence, Tuscany 50123

Italy

www.clubswan36.com