Around the Salon

James Boyd paces the boards at Paris Boat Show

K-Yachting K One Design 33

K-Yachting's new 33ft match racer (above) designed by Juan Kouyoumdjian and Miguel Costa is now a reality. We wrote about the concept of this boat at the design stage. The boat is effectively a 33ft version of an America's Cup Class yacht with great inherent stability and thus no hiking.

There is a now a class rule for the boat and a class series which includes racing for the One Ton Cup. Six examples have now been built and the boat was available at the Salon Nautique for 120,000 Euros.

The dimensions of the boat have been slightly altered since the design stage. They are now:

LOA: 10.30m
Beam: 2.20m
Draft: 1.90m
Disp: 2.10 tonnes
Keel weight 1.11 tonnes
Mainsail: 31 sqm
Genoa 19sqm
Asymmetric spi: 71sqm

For more information click here or email K-Yachting here . For more photos see the following page

And now for something completely different

In France there are more youth sailing schemes in both schools, regions and clubs than is possible to image. Certainly winning the award for the most unusual boat at the Salon Nautique was the Goelette Mercator which her cat-guru designer Yves Loday describes as being like a small 'pirate boat' and thus perfect to take kids afloat in.

A 7.60m long by 2m open boat, the Mercator is schooner rigged with two identically sized spars, a jib and a triatic. There is the option for a 13sqm spinnaker. The booms are relatively high to prevent knocking errant kids overboard or out cold. The boat has a transom-hung rudder. Down either side of the boat are benches which extend the full length of the boat. Beneath these is the mechanism for the twin centreboards each carrying 65kg of ballast. Thus the boat can be easily driven up on to a beach.

The Mercator is designed to take 11 crew and is priced at 22,700 Euros.

For more information email the builders Sirena here or see their website .