Ok, not a "classic" but..

[Tony]

The other day my wife and I were touring a marina and we saw what must be the strangest rig I've ever seen. I assume it was for some kind of ocean race. The boat itself was quite obviously some kind of custom job, it was about 50 feet long, with an aft cockpit. There were virtually no windows other than two or three hatches in the deck. There was no doghouse, persay, the deck just sort of ramped gradually backwards to the companionway. The hull was black. The strangest thing was the sailing rig. The mast was shaped like a very long wishbone, with the forked end fastened into pivot points on the side-decks next to the dodger. The "fork" came together about halfway up the mast to form a single stick, and the whole affair was raked forward about 15 degrees. There was the standard forestay, then an inner stay about halfway back, from which actually hung the mainsail on a boom. The backstay was probably at a 25 degree angle, and there were several other lower backstays. The..er...pilot of this craft sits on what looks like a bicycle seat in front of the wheel, the transom is open. Does anyone know anything about such a boat, or what that rig might be called? Just thought I'd ask :-)

[Tim]

Sounds interesting! Any chance of a photo?

The closest thing I can find on short notice that looks a little bit like your description is this mast-aft sailing rig. This one uses a fairly traditional spar, rather than the wishbone you described, however.



There's a discussion of this rig located at the following link.

Running Tide Yachts

[Tony]

Well, I don't have a digital camera, but I'll work on a photo.
I'm familiar with the rig you posted, I just had never seen the wishbone configuration mentioned before.

Tony