Nacra F18
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The Infusion made its debut in top level competition at Eurocat in May. Jeremy Evans goes flying on the very ny new racing boat is judged by its results. At their first major regatta - Eurocat in Carnac in early May, ranked alongside the F18 World championship and Round Texel as a top grade event - Nacra Infusions finished second, third and sixth in a fleet of 142 Formula 18. Why not first? The simple answer is that Darren Bundock and Glenn Ashby, who won Eurocat in a Hobie Tiger are currently the most hard-to-beat cat racers in the world, although the Dutch guys racing the top Infusions were clearly pretty good as well. This is the third new Formula 18 cat produced by Nacra in 10 years. They started with the Inter 18 in 1996, designed by Gino Morrelli and Pete Melvin based in the USA. It was guick, but having the main beam and rig so unusually far forward made it tricky downwind. Five years later, the Inter 18 was superseded by a new Nacra F18 designed by Alain Comyn. It was guick and popular, but could ►

'gybing' daggerboards have a thicker trailing them to twist in their cases and provide extra lift upwind. powerful boat. Formula 18 is a development class open to all boat builders, sailmakers and mast makers. The 2006 F18 world championship has an entry of 160 teams from 16 countries racing at Hyères. Next year's eighth F18 world championship will be held in Australia. Carbon fibre and other expensive materials are forbidden to keep cost down to the current level of around £12,000 ready-to-race. F18 cats have a maximum length of 18ft, minimum racing weight of 180kg ex-crew, and a rating of...

Nacra F18. Our sailing locations were Portland The Infusion stands out in terms of design. M&M describe the hulls as 'third generation wave piercing' to prevent pitching and increase resistance to pitchpoling, but what really strikes you is that this cat looks bigger than the Capricorn, Tiger or any other F18 with massive volume in the main hull area to carry both rig and crew. What's more, both hulls are canted outwards by about four degrees. Nacra claim this increases righting moment, reduces water resistance, improves steering response and reduces pitchpoling downwind. Whatever else, it...

ANSWER BACK from XXXXXXXXX He continues, 'I have never sailed a cat that can be driven downwind in breezy conditions like this one. Even with my crew weighing less than 60kg out on the wire, I can sail high to pick up speed and drive off downwind as the boat accelerates. The only time I've not been confident is downwind in light conditions when it seems very difficult to get the hull "unstuck". More time on the water is obviously needed!' So is this third time lucky for Nacra? Whatever happens, the Infusion is a beautifully presented and very welcome newcomer to high performance sailing,...