Hobie 33

Description

The Hobie 33 is a groundbreaking ultralight, fully planning monohull sailboat designed by Hobie Alter and Phil Edwards in 1982 and built by Hobie Cat from 1983 to 1987 (approximately 170 hulls). At 33 ft LOA, 8 ft beam (plus 12 ft 6 in hiking wings), and just 2,900 lbs. displacement (1,450 lbs. in a retractable bulb keel that lifts hydraulically for trailering), she was the first production boat to bring true beach-cat speed and handling to a keelboat. With a towering 45 ft fractional rig carrying 420 sq ft upwind (plus huge masthead spinnakers up to 1,000 sq ft), the Hobie 33 routinely hits 18–25 knots off the wind and can sustain double-digit speeds upwind in 15+ knots—numbers that embarrassed most 50-foot IOR maxi boats of the era. The cockpit is wide-open with twin tillers and four-person hiking wings that fold for transport, while below is pure racer minimalism: two pipe berths, a tiny head, and no galley. The boat was conceived as a “big Hobie 18” that could be ramp-launched and legally trailered behind a pickup; the entire keel retracts into the hull, and the mast drops with a single pin. Though dominant in early 1980s West Coast events (winning the 1984 Long Beach to San Francisco race outright), the class faded after production ended when Hobie refocused on cats. Today the surviving fleet (concentrated in California and Australia) is experiencing a strong revival, with restored examples trading for $25,000–$55,000 and still winning PHRF races against boats twice their length—proof that the radical “beach cat on steroids” concept was decades ahead of its time.