Good things come to those who wait, and sailing the HH44-SC confirmed the adage. Even under delivery sails—and only a main and genoa, at that—we fairly flew across the Chesapeake Bay on a breezy fall day after the U.S. Sailboat Show in Annapolis, where hull No. 2 had missed a debut on the docks by just days.
When this intriguing new design did arrive, we were eager to spend time with it—and so, evidently, were lots of other people. Tied up across the harbor from where the boat show was dismantling, this boat was a traffic-stopper, looking screaming fast sitting still and drawing the attention of anyone who passed by. While the execs at HH stress that the 44 was designed as a luxurious, bluewater cruising cat, there’s no mistaking the performance lineage here. HH built its reputation and earlier boats on the designs of speedsters Morelli & Melvin, and while this new 44 was de-signed inhouse—by Hudson Yacht Group naval architect James Hakes, son of HH co-founder Paul Hakes—that DNA is still evident in the boat’s rakish profile, 10-foot-long, prepreg carbon daggerboards, and 64-foot, fractional carbon spar, which topped out at 72 feet with the standard, grounded lightning rod. And,
