Sailing “Grace” (2019-2025)

In 2019, I took on an extensive restoration project of a 1980 Artekno H-Boat called “Grace.” Even though the H-Boat is a common racing class in Europe, mine was one of the few on the West Coast of the United States. It seemed like a worthy boat to bring back to life both for its aesthetic beauty and lineage. The H-Boat descends from the folkboat, which appealed to my motivations for sailing: minimalist coastal cruising, often singlehanded.

Racing did not interest me much at first, although it’s always nice to go fast and point well into the wind. When I began this project, I preferred to compromise comfort for performance and performance for safety. These posts share my journey of restoration and four years of actively sailing Grace.

After six years of ownership, I sold Grace in late 2025. Grace surely continues to delight her new owner. My new boat project is the restoration of my family’s Beneteau First 36.7, “Pirouette.” This is a collaborative project with my father. We are now in the process of outfitting this more ocean-capable boat for coastal and offshore racing.

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By the numbers

The H-Boat balances relative performance with seaworthiness and simplicity. Comparing the H-Boat to the Nordic Folkboat and to the Santa Cruz 27 (a popular racing class in my region that is the same length as the H-Boat although of a different generation of sailboat design):

• The comfort ratio of the H-Boat (15.78) falls between the Santa Cruz 27 (11.64) and the Nordic Folkboat (22.13). Its motion comfort is less like a coastal cruiser, such as the Folkboat, and more like a lightweight racing boat, even though perhaps more kindly than high performance racers like the Santa Cruz 27.
• The displacement to length ratio — an estimate the power required to drive the boat to its nominal hull speed — places the H-Boat as “light” (161.26), which falls between the Nordic Folkboat (“moderate,” 249.22) and the Santa Cruz 27 (“ultralight,” 95.92).
• The balance to length ratio over 40 for the three boats indicates that they are all stiff, powerful boats able to stand up to the wind. Interestingly, the H-Boat (49.97) is just slightly lower ranked than the Santa Cruz 27 (50.00), and both these boats are noticeably lower than the Nordic Folkboat (51.82).
• The sail area to displacement ratio places the H-Boat (19.54) as a reasonably good performance between the under-powered Nordic Folkboat (19.54) and the high-performance Santa Cruz 27 (23.21).
• The capsize screening formula (CSF) or capsize ratio, which compares the beam with the displacement, rates the H-Boat (1.95) as suited for ocean passages much better than the Santa Cruz 27 (2.22) and slightly worse than the Nordic Folkboat (1.78).
• The S#, which estimates probable boat performance versus boats of comparable size, ranks the H-Boat as a racer cruiser (3.29) between the slow/underpowered Nordic Folkboat (1.82) and the fast/racing Santa Cruz 27 (5.32).

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Racing Logs

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Cruising Logs

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Maintenance and Repair Logs