Food for thought

The eight metre yachts are as diverse as their owners. Gaffs, cruisers, classic racers, moderns, you find them all in the eights family. Campaigned and cruised for decades by the same families to a plethora of new owners, boat builders, crewmembers and spectators all having one thing in common. They have been seduced by the golden proportion of the 8 within the metre classes. These boats have the perfect human scale, metre boats above and below somehow loosing the boat to man ratio.

The international eight metre is so perfect. Not to big, not to wet, challenging to sail and beautiful to look at. It is even a yacht to cook in. Swedish star chef Gunnar Forsell cooked magical three course gourmet meals, from his forepeak pantry, on Safir S 6.

Nick Compton, journalist at Classic boat describes the International Metre Rule in a marvellous way.

Read and Bon Apetite!

The gourmet yacht: how it works

To understand how the formula works, imagine it’s a shopping list and you’ve either got £12, £8, £6 and so on to spend, depending on your budget. It’s up to you how you spend it, but you know there’s a certain combination of ingredients which is going to taste (sail) better. So if you spend too much on onions (L or length), you’ll have to spend less on potatoes (S or sail area), and vice versa.

The clever bit is how the rule-makers persuaded you to buy certain ingredients to make a more wholesome meal. By multiplying ketchup (d or hollow sections) by three they’re saying they don’t want too much of that. On the other hand, brown rice (F or freeboard) comes free because the want you to eat lots of that - but everyone knows that too much rice gets stodgy, so you want to go easy on it for a tasty meal.

The divisor on the bottom is only there to make a pretty figure. The boats would look no different if it was 3 or 4 or 153 - the classes would just have different names, so 6-Metre would become 4-Metre or 3-Metere or 0.078-Metre! You can see why they chose 2 or 2.5 or 2.37.

The formula was supplemented by a set of specific regulations specifying such things as mast construction, accommodation and crew numbers. A Table of Scantlings to ensure sound construction was drawn up by Lloyd’s.

L is waterline length, B is beam, G is “chain girth (ie the girth of a chain stretched around the hull from covering board to covering board), d is #”chain girth” minus skin girth, S is sail area and F is freeboard.

The B and d measurements were included to discourage “skimdish” tendencies, while G discourages too much draught and S controls sail area, which was becoming excessive prior to the rule.

The rule-makers have decided ketchup (d) isn’t as bad for you as they thought it was; onions (S) take too long to chop (too big crews required), so the are taxed more heavily. The divisor is changed so the figures still produce the same classes.

Mushrooms and cream (B an G) are now both taken out of the equation (ie not taxed) to encourage fuller flavour (more beam and more draught). The divisor is changed again.

Stir an add seasoning to taste, et voila, a gourmet yacht!