Pug Ugly - The Scow Mini-Transat 6.5

Dave Raison, in his latest scow Mini Transat 6.5, won the Mini Fastnet this past June. There are now other scow Mini 6.5's appearing. Swiss Simon Koster put one together he has named eight Cubed after the number he sails under. Included below are some photos of his new creation.

Make no bones about, these sailboats are Uglee.....High freeboard on a scow shape is not pretty. Simon Koster waved the ugly stick even more by making his cabin top very blocky.

From the The Simpsons, a quote by bartender Moe before he underwent plastic surgery.

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Moe

"I've been called ugly, pug-ugly, fugly, pug-fugly, but never ugly-ugly."

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I'll go with pug ugly. I like scows. I like different. I like that, with these shapes, form follows function. Some would call these Mini 6.5 scows cute. (Can you call a sailboat cute?).

From this bottom-up, bow-on angle, combined with the paint scheme, eight Cubed appears to have the bottom of a rubber ducky bathroom toy.

Ah! That's more like it. The familiar wide arse of a Mini-Transat 6.5.

You can see the odd split, blocky looking, almost comical cabin house with forward facing window in this photo of eight Cubed hanging in the shop before the initial launch.

A video of the start of the Mini-Fastnet. Winner David Raison in #865 with the distinctive blue jib can be seen starting about 56 seconds into the video and then at 2:20. 8-Cubed shows up at the 1:43 mark.

Time to return to a Mini Transat 6.5 post

Nothing like watching some Mini Transat 6.5's let loose downwind. Sit back and get your Internet virtual buzz-on.

Annapolis Sailboat Show

I'm a small boat sailor, and a cheap one at that. I allot about 4 hours to poke around the Annapolis sailboat show and unless a friend prods me, I avoid stepping onto any type of cruising boat. This year, as usual, there wasn't a whole lot for the small boat sailor. Laser Performance (buyers of Vanguard) were represented by surrogate dealer APS. They had their passel of British designed dinghies they are trying to flog onto the American market (names like Vago, and Bahia, and such .... but I must admit I like the smaller Jo Richards Pico and Bug dinghies). Surprisingly they left their two very popular American dinghies, the Sunfish and the V15, out of the show. I didn't see their SB3 keeler at the show either; they were great guns for getting the SB3 going in America last year. To the amusement of the friends I was with, I climbed into the Optimist sized Bug dinghy for a test sail. No wind but I was impressed with how stable this little dinghy is; I leaned hard on the leeward gunwhale and it didn't give up much in the way of a lean. The Bug, being stable, also meant it was somewhat stuck in light air (it has some very big hull strakes that don't help). Still, this is a small dinghy that won't scare the beginner and should be sailable in big breeze (one of the best strengths of the Optimist in my mind!).

Because the in-the-water sailboats were off in numbers, two of the so-called tall ships were berthed on the outer docks ....... The "Pride of Baltimore II" and the pilot schooner, "Virginia". Two of the crew of the "Pride of Baltimore II" were busy varnishing the transom and re-painting the name. I asked the one doing the varnishing what varnish "The Pride" uses ....... it's Epiphanes.

Small wooden boats are one of my soft spots and for some reason, the builder of the Adirondack Guide Boats had a booth in this show (a very rare occurrence indeed). He has a beautiful wood version for around 14K, a cheaper glass version with chines (didn't ask the price) and also offers a wood kit for 3.5K. It seems he sells to a fair number of celebrities ..... he rattled off several names that I have promptly forgotten. For some reason I got a free DVD (maybe I asked the right questions) which I'll get around to viewing one of these days.

Just beyond the Laser Performance booth was the small sport boat row. Two American production versions of the Mini-Transat, a Juan K small day racer that looked like a Mini Transat with no accomodations, a Viper and the new Melges 20 (cost of the Melges 20.... 41K base...... 47K with sails and some covers). If you want to get the thrill of a Laser offwind and spend a whole lot more money, I reckon one of these choices would fit the bill.

Did you say, "Thinking outside the box?"

"Thinking outside the box" is a much overused term, but applicable in the case of this French singlehander, David Raison, who glommed on a bulbous, scow type bow to his Mini Transat 6.5 design and then proceeded to dust the competition in a 3100 mile race from Madiera to Salvador de Bahia, Brazil. The course was mostly reaching, which always favors a hull shape like this, but you've got to give David a huge thumbs up. It's always enjoyable watching a novice designer, with the courage of his convictions, show up all those big yacht design firms.





This comment from reader "Patrick" had me chuckling so I dragged it over to the main post (in race boats, most times, beauty doesn't factor into the equation);

"Thinking inside the bathtub!"

Mini-Transat 6.50's Reaching

Back when I was a young dude I had no idea that sailing technology would create small keelboats that would plane like the high performance dinghies (Int 14's, 505's, Flying Dutchman, 470's) I grew up with. Well they have. And they do it singlehanded! Wowee!

A Big Boy Up and Hammering

Every once in a while I get a hankering to pull out a video of one of those wide-body French offshore speed machines. This is the French PRB, one of those IMOCA 60's.

Video removed from Vimeo.

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A video of the small tykes, the Mini-Transat 6.5's planing can be seen here.