The A40 Racing Concept
Should clubs decide to race the A40 in groups, FlyingHulls will, first and foremost, listen with an open mind to the needs of its sailors and their vision of how the class should develop. It is our concept that the A40 will provide exciting multihull racing though a limited development class while exploring the edges of radio control multihull performance.
The RC sailing community has traditionally gravitated toward one-design racing classes because the level playing field was attractive to neophyte and grizzled veteran alike. However, the beginnings of those class histories always had a development period when the best ways to set-up and tune the boat were formulated. The A40 is a new design, and development in RC multihulls is going through a steep development curve. We believe that the A40 should be a class where the platform and sail area stay relatively static while fins and rig are allowed great latitude, somewhat like the International 1 Meter class. Should the A40 class take hold, that approach should yield great performance improvements while keeping the cost of competing in a zone that won't change exponentially.
FlyingHulls will continually test new components and will make them available to A40 owners when we are sure they will provide a performance upgrade. All registered A40 owners will get those notifications as they come out.
RC sailboat racing is always ultimately controlled by the individual clubs that race the boats, and if a club decides that, for their purposes, they want to limit an aspect of development, their members can easily change fins and/or rig to compete outside their club. This is the best of all possible racing worlds, we believe, and we hope you will give the A40 the opportunity to be one of RC sailing's most successful classes.