Outremer 52

The 52 replaces the Outremer 51, of which about a hundred left La Grande-Motte between 2011 and 2021, and borrows the styling the 55 introduced two years earlier. VPLP and Patrick le Quément spent two and a half years on a brief policed by the kilo: 12.2 tonnes light on 15.73 metres, sabre daggerboards, narrow hulls and a low coachroof that keeps windage down. Steering stays outside, on both sides of the cockpit, with the sails in view — a choice that rules out the sheltered inside helm charter catamarans offer. This is a boat for shorthanded family ocean passages: on a 200-mile test it averaged 8 to 12.5 knots and peaked above 20. The trade-off is an interior that stays plain for the money — beige veneers, sound insulation that could be better — and stowage closer to a 50-foot monohull than to a charter cat. Used, the few boats that surface change hands at close to new-boat money, waiting lists being what they are.