Yachting

86 http://www.yachtingmonthly.com MAY 2016

PHOTOS: GRAHAM-SNOOK.COM

NEW BOAT TEST

Legend Yachts started fitting cockpit

arches long before they were popular.

Have they now redefined the space

inside a small yacht? Graham Snook went to see

Legend 31 – Performance on test

Point

of sail

Apparent

wind

angle

Apparent

wind

speed

Boatspeed

Close-

hauled

Around 30° 14-17 knots 5.4-6.3 knots

Fetch 60° 13-16 knots 5.8-6.3 knots

Beam

reach

90° 8.2-9.6

knots

5.4-5.7 knots

Broad

reach

120° 5.0-6.0

knots

4.9-5.1 knots

Run 180° 4.0-4.5 knots4.2-4.4 knots

Legend 31

B

oat model sizes confuse me.

Bavaria’s new 34 is 32ft, this

Legend 31 is 32ft, my father’s old

Beneteau First 325 was 34ft and

don’t get me started on Elan’s

E3. I’m not suggesting this is a way of

hoodwinking buyers (or harbourmasters),

but it seems the goalposts are forever

moving and the only way to know for sure

is to look at the hull length. ‘Hull length’,

mind, not ‘length overall’ (LOA), for that is

a different can of worms.

The Legend 31’s 31ft 11in hull length is

bigger than her name suggests and her

interior is on an even larger scale, as is the

width of her cockpit. To get headroom in

smaller yacht usually means you end up

with a tubby-looking boat, but Marlow

has pulled off what I consider to be a good

looking hull with more interior volume

than seems possible.

Performance

Our test boat didn’t have wind instruments,

so all wind speeds were recorded at deck

level and wind angles are approximations.

Caveats out of the way, we sailed her in

Force 3-4, and even when pushed in the

gusts (not that there were any that would

over power her) she heeled moderately

and her aft chine dug in, keeping her

tracking straight. She tacked through 90°

and with a bit of breeze she wasn’t slow,

but she wasn’t fast either.

At the helm

The space for the helm isn’t overly

generous. Sitting outboard facing in,

there are no foot braces, so it’s more

comfortable to sit with legs either side of

the wheel. However, space between the

wheel and the seat is too tight to squeeze a

leg through (well, one of my legs at least).

When I pressed the paddle at the base of

the pedestal and canted the wheel towards

me as I sat down, I could use the neat

hinged footblocks forward of the wheel

but it wasn’t possible to reach the paddle

to cant the wheel to extricate myself.

The mainsheet and its traveller are out

of reach if you’re sitting down, but when

standing both can be eased from the helm.

Design & construction

When I sailed her big sister, the Legend

37, I found the aft quarter chines in her

Glenn Henderson-drawn hull do a good

job of increasing grip in the water as she

heels; the 31 also has these chines, to

similar effect. They also serve to add more

volume and hull width aft.

Both hull and deck have a plastic

honeycomb Nida core above the waterline.

The hull is also reinforced with Kevlar,

which is rarely seen on this size of yacht.

The interior is built outside of the boat, in

one module, then bonded into the hull.

ABOVE: The cockpit

is 2.92m wide, but

only 1.5m long

RIGHT: The Legend

is a capable cruiser

with a Tardis-like

interior