ONE DESIGN DOUBLE APPEAL?
Where we tested: Port Ginesta, Barcelona
Conditions: 8-9 knots, flat sea
Model: Dehler 30 One Design, with high inclusive spec such as composite fin keel, carbon mast, water ballast and a retracting stealth drive
‘When viewed from the outside the Dehler looks every bit the racer’
Talk to those who have switched to short-handed offshore racing and you’ll be hard pressed to find many who want to go back to a weather rail stacked with crew. It’s not that they’ve suddenly realised that they don’t like sharing the experience with others, or that the boat just feels cluttered below, but that it is just more satisfying sailing two-up. Plus, it’s often a lot cheaper.
It’s these two factors above all that surely explain the increase in popularity in this kind of sailing.
Yet, unlike the moment when we realised that planing sportsboats were a lot more fun than the tubby lead mines of the day that rolled downwind like metronomes, or the sudden realisation that gybing an asymmetric spinnaker was no harder than tacking a jib, the growth in short-handed offshore sailing has been more gradual. And it is also building from another corner of the sport as the momentum for the new Olympic offshore class in 2024 gathers
