She still surprises me

[HeaveToo]

I was thinking about some of the stuff I have put Saga through lately.  I have to say that this boat has impressed me with how she takes a licking and keeps on ticking.

On this last trip it was the first time that I had her out in serious waves.  I am talking about 5+ foot Chesapeake Bay wind against the tide nasty waves in 15-20 knots of wind.  I mean really nasty, steep, knock the crud out of you waves.  I never once took a wave over the bow even though I was going up wind.  I would steer off of the wind a little more once I got to the top of the wave and power through the wave and up the next one.  It was a dry ride too, which I am really surprised.  I did get a few splashes, but nothing horrible.

I have had her out, this season, in sustained 25 knot winds with a few higher gusts.  I did it with a reefed main and a mostly rolled jib on a tight reach.  I kept her as flat as possible and dumped the main a little on the gusts.  She held up well in this and it was well within the margin of controls.  It wasn't scary at all.

The other thing that I am noticing is that she is a fairly quick sailor.  Her hull speed is 6 knots and I have seen that number often and broken that number on a few occasions (tide and surfing helped but I did this WHILE pulling a 100lb fiberglass dingy).

The PHRF rating for a Compac 23 is 249.  It is faster than a Catalina 22, surprisingly.  Still, she is sailing pretty fast and hanging with bigger boats in average conditions.  In certain conditions she is beating bigger boats.  I am not racing her but I do sail along with other boats and I notice what she does.

Pretty darn impressive!!

[hockeyfool]

Hey, very compelling read and valuable to us 23' owners that might like to open the horizons in sea action like that.
But I also have had our baby out in a blow, past several summers  we had hhhhot, windy 80+ degree sunny days, wind blowing mid 20's with gusts to 30 where I single reefed, had a small storm style jib( about 75% ) and we were rolling along peacefully, with a small wake, all calm on board.
Another occasion I believe was same sunny, cloudy, near ninety degrees, with upper twenties into the thirty mile an hour winds, steady all day , I double reefed, storm jib, and was doing hull speed and better, while drinking tumbler of iced expresso.
We live on a small inland lake  in SE michigan, it is about 4 miles long, and a mile wide in most spots, so I feel both confident to sail in small craft advisories do to close access to home, but also have hightened awareness due to the immediacy of nearing the lee shores.
I recently was invited to help sail a Beneteau first 285 in lake st. Clair, were wind built from 9 to 15 kts , quite nice, the water action was 2 foot rollers that had breaking occasional white caps, so this was not even really rough weather, but when we had to sail at a close reach,the 285 was pitching, rolling, yawling, heeling in a really uncomfortably way. as the course we had to sail made us take this mostly a'beam, so that showed this boat's hull design weakness. Having to heel at 20-25 degrees or reef the main, because this boat has a pathetic fin keel with moderately low ballast.
No thanks, I'll pass sailing in that weeble again! Our 23's would have faired much better.

[Potcake boy]

I've had 5 Com-Pacs and currently own a 23 pilot house. I have also owned two trimarans a Dragonfly 25 and a Corsair 24. If you love sailing performance, and I mean in all aspects not just raw speed, you can't beat the tris. I've out run 45 footers with full sail up and their 80hp motor at WOT. Commonly out ran anything on the water and even a few of the slow motor boats. I will have to say that my Com-Pacs have all been faithful to their design purpose, and to me that is the mark of a good boat. The trimarans did what they were designed to do, and so with the Com-Pacs. When you can take your vessel out and know what to expect and it's delivered reliably each and every sail with safety and comfort, then in my book you have a winner. It isn't just all about speed, which is actually pretty cool by itself, but the pleasure derived from sailing. A unruly boat is neither a pleasure to sail, nor comfortable. If you sail these boats properly and have decent sails, and reef when needed they will deliver a enjoyable sail. Isn't that the point? These boats are not windward witches, but then gentlemen don't sail to weather. they do perform at or above expectation on a reach. Seems nothing sails worth a toot dead downwind, but it's nice when you have a calm day and autopilot to steer while you drink cold beer.