Sunday 25 March 2012

Son of the Farrther


Yesterday I had to cancel the 3.7 Test Sail Day due to low / no wind and test sailor drop out.
And so today I thought... 'It's a great day to see how my 15 year old son takes to the 3.7'.

Luke's just turned 15. He's 45kg ( weighed him on the scales tonight ) and 5'5". He hasn't sailed for 2 years. As he's taken every opportunity to chase girls or skate his local skate park recently. But before this he club raced a Mirror with me crewing for him. And before that did the Optimist thing from the age of about 7. Taking his 30 year old Optimist '2060' to a Silver fleet WIN and some fairly consistent top 5 Silver fleet open meeting places.


So he's no superstar squad sailor but represents an average 15 year old club sailor. So a great test pilot!

So how did his sail in the 3.7 go? Well I'll put it like this... 'Luke now wants to sail again after a 2 year layoff'. In fact he said, 'Dad, I want to start sailing every Sunday now, this boat is really dialed'. I think that sum's up what I saw in the 3.7. A great boat that enables kids and light weight adults to sail an exciting but well mannered trapeze helm boat.

Luke sailed the boat for roughly 2.5 > 3hrs with a combination of trapezing and hiking in wind that was around the 6 >10knts range. With no capsizes and most importantly a massive grin on his face!

I took the 3.7 for a spin after Luke came back in and at 75kg ( I must start running! :-( ) managed a few trips out on the wire as well. Not as sustained as Luke but considering the wind strength dam good fun.

Thanks 3.7 for a great day.

 Apologies for the bad quality. I didn't have a long lens with me, but I felt it was important to show Luke fully trapezing.

Friday 2 March 2012

Up the Ally Pally





What a fantastic show! The interest in the 3.7 was truly astonishing. So much so that I for one almost lost my voice from the amount of talking I did. Even James, Marketing Director of Spinlock commented on the fact that 'he was sorry he hadn't been able to chat all weekend, but he never got an opportunity! Every time I looked around you were talking to somebody! And we were!  So a special thanks from the UK 3.7 Class to Spinlock for providing us with the stand space. We couldn't have done it without you.

So what's the up shot of the show? Well it looks like there the will be at least 5 possibly 6 - 3.7's being built by home builders so far. We also had a lot of interest from professional boat builders, fitting, spar and sailmakers and suppliers. And we will be following these contacts up in the next few weeks with the aim of smoothing the supply chain for home builders and those interested in having a pro boat built. 

The test sail day sign up was good also. With our limit of people being reached. The class will be in touch shortly to confirm emails and telephone numbers soon just in case we need to suspend the day due to weather etc…

All in all a great weekend.

There is just one last thing to say. A big thank you to Piers and Dave for helping out on the stand and chatting through with people why you have decided to build this great little boat.