After a long anticipated wait, I was lucky enough to get out for a sail recently onboard the all new Corsair Pulse 600 trailer trimaran following its world launch at the Sanctuary Cove Boat Show. Designed by Francois Perus of Perus Yacht Design, the Pulse 600 is designed as a simple, safe and exciting one design day sports boat made to easily store and trailer after sailing.

Corsair has had a long history of building innovative sports trailer trimarans, with over 2,000 having been built and sailing around the world and now also the manufacturer of the famous Seawind catamaran brand. The question was, could they take their engineering, performance and trailer-ability of the larger Corsairs that range from 24 to 37 feet and package this into a bite size chunk under 20ft?

We slipped the Pulse off the purpose built trailer at the boat ramp, sliding off easily with the floats tucked under the hull. After unloading, the pontoons were pushed into their horizontal position and bolted into position. A process that took all of about 60 seconds. This is all made possible by using the same folding mechanism as used on the larger Corsair Trimarans, allowing floats to fold up under the boat and retain enough tension in the rig so that the mast can remain raised.

With a little 2hp outboard pushing us out into the bay, we raised the mainsail, unfurled the jib and sailed the boat into the grove. As a 10 knot breeze built and a slight chop, the conditions were perfect, and as the sails filled the windward hull lifted, the leeward hull sliced through the chop, the stern lifted and the boat took off. Hitting 10+ knots, the boat felt great sailing to windward. The tiller was perfectly balanced, light and ridiculously responsive. You gotta love a trimaran when it comes to tacking.

What has always been impressive on land was the waterline length and inbuilt floatation of the floats. Despite being seemingly huge, on water they slice through the water with ease and you can’t help but feel confident as you bare away off the breeze and pull out the top down furling kite, crank on sails, and hot it up.

Using an endless furling line back to the cockpit, the top down furling system worked a treat and would have to go down as one of the easiest kite deploys I have ever done. Though initially it felt a little underpowered as the breeze had dropped to around 8 knots, the Pulse later fell slipped into the grove as the breeze increased to over 10 – 12 knots and became easy to hot up and get some apparent wind working, allowing the boat to be driven further off the breeze at speed.

Hitting 12+ knots of boat speed, it just started to fly along and hum beautifully off the breeze and started to feel closer to an F18 than a Dash or Sprint…it was getting real fun at this stage. We started to drive it pretty hard down wind for the conditions as the apparent wind continued to increase. The float design just continued to impress as we flew through some chop and you could just see the buoyancy on those babies keeping the boat planning. Moving weight aft a little popped them out more and it became more of a sled.

With three guys onboard, the boat was moving nicely, but you could easily sail with 2 onboard instead. All of the lines are fed conveniently back to the cockpit, which is comfortable and BIG. With padded non-skid on the floor, deck and floats, the Pulse is ridiculously comfortable, though do expect to get a splash every now and then on the deck as you crank her up. But hey, that’s half the fun!

Sitting out on the floats is not too different than hiking on a trapeze on a small boat – you get great leverage out there to provide ballast, but it’s a good distance off the water and a heck of a lot easier than hiking.

Inside the front cuddy cabin, you have surprisingly good storage. The bonnet can pop off to load gear into, or easier access forward for lake racing, though I prefer it one to offer some shelter. Beneath the floor, you have a cool little hatch that opens giving you access to quite deep storage below to keep personal items completely dry and protected.

The cockpit has an open back allowing it to self drain quickly. The centerboard slides through a hole in the cockpit floor and sits beautifully flush to the cockpit floor when in position. There is a simple aluminum rotating rig, boom furling on the mainsail and dyneema side stays to keep weight down.

All in all, sailing the Pulse was just wicked fun. The kind of fun I haven’t felt since racing sports cats, yet it feels bigger and is robust – it’s a proper boat. I could see myself going out with the family for a day to the other side of the bay, or throwing in the esky and tent for an overnighter. Or even drag the boat up the beach and camp on the tramps. I can also imagine some awesome racing around the cans on the weekend and I can’t wait until the other three boats including mine, arrive in Australia.  I can’t wait for some more wind and time on the water.

Have a Corsair Pulse 600 delivered? I think so!

Read More Corsair Pulse 600 Details >>

Contact Your Local Dealer >>

Fantastic footage of the Pulse 600. Thanks to Benoit Moch, this video was shot mid November in Brittany, France. 
For more information about this one design trimaran class, click here.
To see more videos of our Corsair trimarans, click here.

The Tahiti Pearl Regatta (TPR) is the sailing rendezvous in French Polynesia, with the 14^th edition just completed the 24 to 27^th May.  Taking place in the leeward isles, it’s a fantastic way to explore, sail and have fun in an extremely beautiful environment.

CORSAIR MARINE was one of the official sponsors of this event showing their commitment to developing the Corsair Fleet worldwide.

Present in the TPR Race Village Tuesday 23rd and Wednesday 24^th, the CORSAIR MARINE s booth was well located and brochures were distributed to all race participants during their registration.  On Wednesday 24^th, in partnership with our local distributor SAIL TAHITI, CORSAIR MARINE ran the TPR ‘Speed Runs’ on 2 Corsair Pulse 600 trimarans.  This promotional event gained a lot of attention with regular live reporting and video footage.  The speed runs were run just in front of the harbour and welcomed around 20 participants new to Pulse 600 sailing.  A bottle of champagne was presented to the winning team.

On Thursday 25th the regatta started, with the fleet going from Raiatea to Huahine Island, 22 miles directly upwind. The CORSAIR Pulse 600s were amongst the first, passing almost all monohulls. On Friday 26th the day started by a classic round the mark race followed by a downwind race back to Raiatea. With 15-20 knots of breeze and 1.5 meters of swell, the CORSAIR Pulse 600s recorded speeds well above 20 knots and once again were among the first to cross the line. On Saturday 27^th there was another round the buoys race followed by the very tactical “round Tahaa island” race. This was very spectacular with strong gusts coming down from the summits of the island and the day was spent in shallow waters of the lagoon.  The CORSAIR Pulse 600 took line honours!

In this 14^th edition of the TPR, the multihull class really shone and was the focus of the media with some great results. In elapsed time the CORSAIR Pulse 600s were in the top 2 coming on the heels of the Diam 24 from Tresors de Tahiti (teamed by professionals). In compensated time the overall winner was the Outremer 45 Nusa Dua from French actor Pierre Cosso, followed by Ekolo Cat owned by Nicolas Gruet, the Catathai designer and then our team Sail Tahiti with the CORSAIR Pulse 600s ranking 3rd and 5^th.

Overall a super event in excellent conditions.

Learn more about the Pulse 600 HERE>>

The Pulse 600 and Don were featured on “Good Day Atlanta,” Chanel 5’s Morning News Program. This was a great way to start the show on Thursday morning. Paul Millikin, host of Good Day Atlanta, put Don at ease with his very personable approach to interviewing. He loved The Pulse and of course he wanted one!  

The Pulse received a very enthusiastic reception at the show. And it looked so good. We were delighted to meet so many sailors who live and work in and around Atlanta. Many people told us of their dream to learn to sail. We definitely want to help them with that dream. We also enjoyed excellent tales of sailing days gone by. It was fun to watch people’s faces brighten as they shared with us the glory days of their youth sailing beach cats. The Pulse definitely sparked the spirit of adventure among many enthusiastic visitors. We were jammed each day and had a great time.

We were very fortunate to meet Karen Ryan, an exceptional Nautical Photographer. Thank you Karen for taking photos at the show:

Don’s first first sail on the Pulse was in light wind (about 6 knots), but he was very pleased with how the boat sails. “Very responsive helm, good helm balance, upwind tacking angles were very good. Top boat speed with spinnaker was almost 9 knots.” CLICK HERE for the full track with speed data.

Weekend Demo sails on the Pulse 600 will be available in Fort Walton Beach 

Feb 6-7

Feb 27

March 12-13

March 19-20

April 9-10

April 16

May 14-15

May 21-22

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​We are excited to announce that Randy Smyth, lead coach of our Multihull Performance Sailing Clinics, is in Miami right now coaching the US Olympic multihull hopefuls on Nacra 17’s. Randy is an exceptional teacher so these competitors have the best. Of course Randy will be back for the May Performance Sailing Clinic. The US Olympic Sailing Team has officially qualified for the Olympic Games this summer! Congratulations.

Four pulse 600 trimarans have just completed 2 weeks of intense racing action in all extremes.  The four newly launched one design trimarans were thrown straight into the deep end with entries into the back to back regattas, Multihull Solutions Multihull Regatta and Cape Panwa Phuket Race Week.

“A newly delivered set of quadruplets, fresh out of the Corsair factory in Vietnam – the Pulse 600 Corsairs – were being assembled and launched in the Boat Lagoon mid Phuket Island for their maiden voyages south to Chalong Bay. The plucky crew battled the same winds of some 30+kts on the way down and miraculously survived the journey mostly intact “shaken but not deterred”. Talk about a baptism of fire for their first outing. Things could only get better they thought, but in this case the wind, rains and sweeping squalls continued right through Multihull Solutions Regatta without let up.”

– Bob Mott – for the full article see next months edition of Australian Multihull World

Across the two weeks on the water the fleet was truly tested, with Multihull Solution regatta providing winds of up to 35kts. Cape Panwa Hotel Race Week had the opposite, with calmer conditions of 5 to 15kts. Inside the bay and a little less sea-state we were able to comfortably carry full main in 20knts. When the sea-state was worse we would reef a little earlier.

The volume in the floats is surprisingly forgiving and tends to cut thru any chop much easier than other trimarans we have experienced. The balance of boat is extremely light but still very responsive. The boats are very crew weight sensitive, sailing 2 up is the best combo for a race environment  ( in my view )  and the cockpit is uncluttered and easy to maneuver.

The boat weights sail ready with outboard, life jackets etc was 483 kg with a crew weight of 160kg. The OMR rating was .77 which in this part of the world is pretty good when you have to race under OMR and if we were competing  in the Racing Multihull class we would have placed 3^rd over all.

“Four new Corsair Pulse 600’s make up the Corsair class and after a clean start it quickly became a two horse race between SuDu 1 and SuDu 3. Launched just two weeks ago, these small trimarans showed their pedigree with some outperforming some of the Firefly 850’s on the same course and in the same conditions.”

– Duncan Worthington

Sheeting is easy and simplistic and will be great for the day sailor. Jibing thru the slot wasn’t an issue and the furling system made sail handling a breeze.

Up wind the boat trucks, on occasions we were pointing higher then the bigger multihulls and were hitting the top mark before the 30ft firefly class. The Pulse surprisingly pointed higher than any other trimaran we have experienced.

The shy spinnaker is great if you want to sail angles and best sailed around the 70 to 80 AWA , but lacks a little area when you want to carry the breeze at lower angles. We will be reviewing a larger Spinnaker design with North Sails and if the design is changed we will replace spinnakers on all pre launched pulses to ensure the Pulse 600 remains a true One Design class.

Competition between the four boats was tough and in many cases positions were separated by mere seconds, see the results HERE

What a fantastic weekend for one of Corsairs newest dealers! The team from Mittelmanns Werft, Corsairs Northern Germany dealer has just completed their first regatta, only days after receiving their first Pulse 600. Racing in a fleet of larger trimarans and multihulls the pulse performed extremely well despite the less than ideal conditions.

“We sailed our just delivered, brand new PULSE 600 the first time during KIEL WEEK and had a fantastic Race in a competitive fleet of seven Trimaran. Being the smallest boat and faced with tricky conditions in 20 – 25 knots of wind and choppy seas, we were thrilled by the boats performance – especially upwind we sailed faster and pointed higher than our competitors. So we finally crossed the line after 28 miles in 2^nd position! Even in those gusty conditions, the boat was easy to be handled by our crew of three on all courses – and the furling spinnaker proved to be one very nice detail to adjust the sail wardrobe quick and without hassle. ”

– Henning Mittelmann

 

This boat is exciting to race. If you’re interested in learning more about the Pulse 600, we have Pulse Performance Centers in the US.

Contact your local Pulse Performance Center >>

LEARN MORE ABOUT CORSAIR  PULSE 600 >>> 

The Pulse 600 continues to impress me. I had it out this weekend on Chocktawhatchee Bay Florida in “fairly sporty” conditions–first by myself in perhaps 12-20 knots. Then later in the afternoon with my friend Bob Hodges who joined me for a blast around the bay in winds gusting into the mid to high 20s. Bob is a highly experienced sailor, and has competitively raced boats including Lasers, a Corsair Sprint, a foiling A Class catamaran and a Weta. Let’s just say Bob is fairly critical of any boat that lacks performance.

We were both blown away with how much wind the Pulse can take and feel fully under control. The steering is perhaps the best I have experienced on any boat, and it has a huge amount of stability. Once it gets planing its a real hoot. We both agreed that if we had been sailing on our respective Corsair Sprints in these conditions, e.g. reaching in 25 knots plus) we would be reefed. Well the Pulse took the wind in its stride with full main and jib!  But that is not to say its underpowered in light air: it seems to do well in both, with the caveat that few boats are particularly fast in less than 5 knots of wind.

I can’t wait to sail the Pulse side by side with other Corsair models which I have more experience with e.g. the 28R and Sprint. I think it will be faster downwind, but how it compares to those yardsticks upwind will be interesting. Also I would like to explore the reasonable upper wind limit is for deploying the spinnaker. In the conditions we were sailing in on Saturday we did not feel any need for it–as we were flying downwind with just main and jib. A spinnaker may have been too much, I am not sure. Only more time and more experience with the Pulse will tell.

As you can see I am loving sailing this boat. It is amazingly versatile for a small boat (although its bigger than you might think) and feels sporty but totally under control in both light and heavy air. You can single hand it easily, but it has room for 4 or 5 people in comfort if you want to take a group of friends sailing. Better though, get them to get their own Pulse!

The one design trimaran class, Corsair Pulse 600 is here. Come over and see us at this week’s Atlanta Boat Show!