MOD70: World’s coolest yachts

Yachting World has been asking top sailors and marine industry gurus to choose the coolest and most innovative yachts of our times, and British offshore competitor Sam Goodchild nominated the MOD70 class trimaran. Here’s the report:

“In terms of complexity for speed, there isn’t anything else which has such a good ratio as a MOD70. We’ve been over 40 knots [boatspeed] on them, and with Phaedo we used to sail for up to 200 days a year, all around the world, with just two shore crew. We were sailing offshore with just five people, so you’ve got super high performance for relatively easy upkeep.

“We’d be doing the Caribbean regattas against boats like Comanche, they’d have 20-something people on the rail and we had five, doing circles around them! Then we did all the transatlantic races – for me it’s an amazing boat.

“The MOD70s are robustly built, but also fast. [designers VPLP] took learnings from the Orma 60 class, all the best bits, tamed them down a little so they’re a bit less dangerous, and came out with a boat which was simple and fast. We raced against the old Groupama Orma 60, and when you see how much more complicated the Ormas are, the MOD 70s definitely struck the right balance.”

MOD 70 stats rating
Top speed: 40 knots
LOA: 21.3m/70ft
Launched: 2011
Berths: 2
Price: €1million
Adrenalin factor: 95%

For Yachting World’s list of cool boats, click here.