too fast for words

The 100′ Maxi Speedboat arrived in Newport in the wee hours this morning, pushing 1000+ miles out of the way (along with the boat name graphics) in a hair over three days – with a short crew, just three sails (no kites), and tons of gear in the bow.  30+ knots, 10+ meter seas, and imagine what she could’ve done in race trim!  Stay tuned later in the week for the on-deck and down-below walk through videos from Clean’s visit to Florida, and keep posted by joining Speedboat’s Facebook page for frequent updates, now that the crew has proven themselves to be media whores – just like us!  Here’s a short report from the trip (photo from Yachtspotter US):

Just some comments on the Palm Beach to Newport Delivery that we just completed. A lot of fun, we spent 85% of the time VMG downwind, gybing thru the Gulf Stream. Stan used some pretty interesting techniques to figure out the corners and bends in the stream and our wind GRIB was spot on most of the time. One of the challenges that we faced was the fact that our sail inventory was limited to just 3 sails, a delivery main (short luff), and 2 fore sails, a solent, and a jib top. Another challenge was the significant amount of weight in the bow – a much more significant performance factor than I originally thought. We had trouble keeping the bow up, but this being a glorified delivery meant we had to carry loads we normally wouldn’t. The bow on this boat is huge and has tremendous volume, it is 10+ feet high and and 17+ feet wide at some points – but we where burying it deep at points. We got some weight out of the bow and she really lit up. The boys have done a tremendous job pimping out the boat and getting her 98% of the way back to perfection. The next 2 months are going to be very exciting. Keep checking this space!