Daysailer

I usually performed my crew duties with gusto if not consummate skill and this got me on several "regular crew" lists. Before long I had the pick of which dinghy I would crew on. I sailed on Stars, Thistles, International 14s, 110s, Geary 18s (Flatties), Lightnings, Snipes, Penguins, Dragons, Evergreens, six-meters, PCs and my all-time favorite, the Raven. The Raven was a 24-foot open dinghy with a minimal foredeck and a big, wide-open cockpit with long seats. On a good day with the wind hitting 20 or better we could get the Raven onto a full plane. I have a soft spot in my heart for big daysailers. I owned a Soling and I owned an Etchells. I raced each on rare occasions, but for me they were just nice big, aggressive daysailers.

The Nelson/Marek office has teamed up with Jim Betts of Truckee, California, to produce this exciting looking Sierra 26 daysailer. It has a fixed keel so it's not a dinghy, but it's easy to see this design as a development of the Soling/Etchells type. The beauty of the fixed, deep, bulbed keel is that you will not have to be concerned with capsizing.

You will have to sit on the side decks as there are no seats inboard so in effect you will always be "hiking." The cockpit itself is deep enough to keep the grandchildren safe. Almost all the lines are led discreetly under the cockpit sole to a control console in the middle of the cockpit where they can be easily reached by the helmsman. There is a fine tune and a gross tune for the mainsheet coming off the aft end of the console. Headstay tension, vang and mast-bend controls are also led to the console. There is no mainsheet traveler but instead a double-ended bridle does the job. The spinnaker sheets are led from the block aft under the deck to exit in the cockpit walls just forward of the console. Even the spinnaker pole downhaul leads back to exit at the console. Jib sheets are led so they can be adjusted from the weather side.

The hull form is unusual in that it almost develops a hard chine in the last 26 percent of the LOA. I say "almost" because there is a sharp turn just above the waterline, but it never goes completely hard. This feature is combined with a skifflike midsection to promote planing. At the dock the boat weighs about 1,200 pounds with a 250-pound bulb at the bottom of an aluminum fin. The keel is removable for trailering. Draft is 5 feet, 6 inches.

It probably makes sense to include the crew weight with the boat's displacement for the D/L. Note that the boat is drawn sitting at the "with crew" flotation. Say three crewmembers weighing an average of 175 pounds each: This raises the displacement to 1,750 pounds and gives us a D/L of 77.7. This is in the ultralight range.

The rig uses carbon spars and there is a long slot at the partners allowing for a wide range of mast rake. In a breeze the mast will go forward. In the light stuff it will come aft to add helm and feel. Rig tension is handled by the adjustable headstay. Mast bend is handled by a Star-class-type mast ram. The jib has some overlap and can be barberhauled with proud-mounted cheek blocks. If we use the displacement with crew and add the roach to the mainsail and overlap to the jib we get an SA/D of 37.46. That should keep you ghosting along nicely. The spinnaker is huge and raises the sail area to more than 700 square feet.

Jim Betts is building this boat to race on Lake Tahoe. He has in mind a one-design class of these boats. The hulls and decks are carbon fiber skins over honeycomb core.

There are a lot of strings to pull on this one if you want to get the most out of it. That may bother some but like stick-shifting and double-clutching an old MG, these adjustments do deliver performance dividends. If you are lazy you can just set everything on "automatic." You will still be fast.