Cal 29 cockpit drain

[L124C]

A dock mates Cal 29's cockpit drain consists of a rubber plug in the stern. I was at the helm and he remarked that there was some water in the cockpit, and we should drain it when we were no longer under sail. I reached down with my bare foot and took the plug out, assuming that surely it was designed to drain while underway. He informed me that, in fact, I was letting the bay into the boat! I asked him what would happen if the boat got popped. He said that he has been in fairly large seas and has never been pooped. The boat has a large cockpit. I have always heard good things about Cal's and was impressed with the way the boat sailed. It felt much larger than it's 29 feet. For the life of me, I can't figure out way Cal would have used this method to drain a large cockpit. I mean, sure, you have have only one thru hull, but one good following wave would turn the large cockpit into a giant Jacuzzi! Can anyone enlighten me as to Cal's strategy?

[svHyLyte]

The cockpit drain on a Cal 29 consists of an approximately 3" dia hole at the base of the transom in a small well slightly below the level of the cockpit sole (we owned a Cal 29 for many years). If that drain is below the water level under any but very limited circumstances the yacht is out of trim sternward. One friend of ours installed an external "flapper" type drain cover on his boat as, occassionally, he would get some water into the cockpit from a stern wave but we rarely ever had that occur on our boat, even in very heavy following seas (fwiw our auxillary was a Yanmar 2GMFW). In no case should that drain be blocked as the cockpit will hold a heck of a lot of water which will make the yacht unmanagable in heavy seas.

FWIW...

s/v HyLyte