Why a powercat? What’s it for?

Questions as banal as they are provocative at the beginning of a boat test like this. Most sailboat catamaran on the market today have pretty big (too big?) motors, and recent trends in terms of equipment, comfort and space have resulted in these multihulls becoming significantly heavier, making their engines less and less “auxiliary”. As a result, in the context of summer sailing, the use of the sails themselves is sometimes almost secondary. As a result, even though motor sailing isn’t necessarily a source of pleasure, most multihull sailors are already well versed in fishing. So, offering these boaters a powercat is not a heresy. Not to mention that the power catamaran market is awash with motorboat customers who are tired of the rolling of monohulls as well as first-time buyers. If genuine sailing, in windy regions, remains a pure pleasure for coast hopping, racing or oceanic wandering, it means work and doesn’t necessarily lend itself well to the demands of a tight schedule. The upshot of this is that the powercat market has been experiencing a particularly significant boom (notably in the United States) in recent years. Its share of the mult...