Worrisome, a different way to approach that walk to the post office, and about that new normal...
It's funny how some thing connect within your brain. A friend and I were conversing via email about sailboat design and performance and all of a sudden I had a moment of understanding that kicked in like a two by four upside the head.
Performance is not just about speed.
Of course, I know that performance is actually the sum of a great many parts but, when is all is aid and done, it's mostly speed-centric.
Way back when I seriously contemplated doing the Mini TransAt partly as there were so few entrants from the USA at the time and because I just wanted to do a single hand transatlantic and kick some ass. Also Dudley Dix had just come up with a Mini plan that just screamed build me!
The design brief of such a cutting edge boat IS all about speed and getting from one point to another faster than the other boats in its class.
Now, twenty something years later, I can still look at the design and appreciate it's virtues but now I think of other ways to harvest the design's performance.
For instance, The Didi Mini and the newer Didi Mini MK3 would be serious overkill for local racing down here and a smaller rig would still kick some serious ass against most of the local competition and the Mini's big rig is a lot of work for just bragging rights. While the Didi Cruise-MK3 is a detuned version of the full tilt boogie MK3 with the added advantage of a lifting keel and would still kick local ass albeit in a more sedate fashion.
Which, when you think of it, is still all about performance but performance in aid of purpose rather than just having performance as the goal. A slightly different mind set if you will.
As far as my abandoned Mini Transat venture, I still regret not building the boat or doing the race but by my sums the hassle factor of doing a campaign, finding sponsors, and all of the non-sailing craziness involved just did not add up to something I wanted to do.
Listening to Jo James
So it goes...
