How is the A Class SWORD performing?
A Our long order book and the late announcement of the 2005 world championship event meant we made no more than 4 of the boats – design named SWORD – by then. All took part in the event. Phillip Playle badly damaged his finger before the event and was unable to sail his own boat. It was helmed by Ken Binks for the first time at the event and Ken went on to place 2nd. Graham Bantock’s own boat won and the other two got excellent results for their owners. Either Bantock or Playle won the other PRACC events that they took part in during the year so rounding off very happily the time and effort put into the project. The boat is clearly very fast in a wide range of conditions and the nature of the class suggests this is likely to remain so for a long period. The 6 Metre RENAISSANCE design from 1986 remains a top performing boat in its class in 2009. If that is anything to go by we might hope to get competitive racing from SWORD in 2028. SAILSetc built SWORDs took the top two places at the 2
