Sorry, Silmaril. I disagree with you.
I spent all of last season as a volunteer for the offical''s boat for the laser chamionship as my yacht club''s blood sacrifice...err...contribution. Anyway, I spent 23 bloody Sunday mornings bobbing around and watching the lasers do their damndest in all conditions as the sailors competed for national chamionship points and a possible place for the Australian Olympic team, so it was serious stuff.
And about 40% of the time, the little tiny skiffs that had a hull literally the size of a small bathtub, huge outriger trampoline type things sitting at about 45degrees up from the hull and a single person strapped into the
rigging would come tearing through like a motorcycle gang through a crowd of old ladies with shopping trolleys. The guys in the little skiffs were not any more comfortable then the laser sailors....but they certainly were a whole lot faster!
(I later dicovered that one of the little bathtub skiffs was also worth about the same as a midrange BMW)
So, to summerise, I did not mean to demean the lasers and all who sail in them....but I was pointing out that going fastest in class sailing is not the same as going fast on an objective measure, neccassarily.
By the way, one of our club members managed to get an old Europe class
dinghy to go faster then any laser....it was falling off the jetty crane sling at the time!
Sasha