VX sailboats: a one-design brand, not a boatyard
VX is a one-design racing brand, not a boatbuilder. It began with designer Brian Bennett, whose company, Bennett Yachting, held the design rights and — rather than building the boats itself — contracted two established Olympic-class small-boat yards, Ovington Boats in the UK and Mackay Boats in New Zealand, to build them. That division has held throughout the brand's history: design intellectual property has passed from one company to another — Bennett Yachting originally, then Mackay Boats after a March 2024 transfer — while construction has stayed with the same yards throughout, and a separate class association, recognized internationally by World Sailing, sets and polices the racing rules. Three models carry the VX name: the VX One, a two-to-three-person sport keelboat; the VX Evo, a singlehanded asymmetric dinghy that followed it; and the VX Two, a doublehanded skiff built on the Evo's hull.
Origins and ownership
Brian Bennett, CEO of Bennett Yachting, was the VX One's lead designer, working alongside Ross Weene of Rodger Martin Design. The design concept grew out of a review of performance one-design demographics worldwide, aimed at the international two-to-three person racing enthusiast, according to US Sailing's class profile. In August 2013, Yachts and Yachting reported that Ovington Boats and Mackay Boats had been announced as the two builders providing tightly controlled international production of the design — tight control being the point, since keeping boats built oceans apart to the same standard is the core engineering problem in one-design racing. Bennett noted that Ovington and Mackay compete against each other in the 49er and 49er FX classes while collaborating closely on the VX One. Ovington's own credentials include the 49er, 29er, Flying Fifteen, I-14, and Musto Performance Skiff; Mackay's include the 470 and 49er.
Bennett Yachting, Mackay Boats, and Ovington Boats worked closely together for the decade that followed. In March 2024, Mackay Boats acquired the intellectual-property rights to the VX range from Bennett Yachting; Mackay and Ovington continued as the range's builders afterward, with Bennett continuing to provide support. "I'm delighted that Mackay Boats is taking on the vision Bennett Yachting set out to achieve with the VX boats," Bennett said of the transition. Separately, World Sailing officially recognized the VX One as an International Class following a vote by the World Sailing Council at its Annual Conference — recognition that required the class to maintain an active owners association with a formal constitution and technical rules, plus consistent racing activity across multiple continents, underscoring that the class association is a governance layer, not a builder.
Construction through the eras
The VX One pairs a lifting keel — extruded, hard-anodized aluminum for consistent shape and durability, raised on the main halyard — with a 135-pound lead bulb on a milled, fiberglass-covered 30-pound aluminum high-aspect fin, letting the boat be launched, recovered, and towed on a combination trailer. Its hull is biaxial E-glass fabric infused with vinylester resin either side of a Divinicell foam core, with components bonded using Scigrip structural adhesive; its low freeboard, fine plumb bow, and wide stern with a softening hard chine were built around a clear-coated carbon mast from Southern Spars of New Zealand and a high-performance-profile Carbon/E-Glass rudder. The VX Evo carries the construction forward with an all-up weight of 77 kilograms in a double-vacuum epoxy lay-up, its hull vacuum-bagged in E-glass, carbon, and epoxy over a foam core to minimize weight while maximizing stiffness. Bennett pointed to the hull's "Comanche cusp" — a kick-out on the transom at the chine line, borrowed from modern TP52 hull forms, that washes the wake flat rather than letting it climb the topsides — as the boat's signature detail. The Evo went through the USA's small-craft certification, with panel stiffness engineered toward a 15-year race life, and its two-piece mast slides under the foredeck so the whole rig can be carried inside the cockpit for transport.
Lines and generations
The VX One reached the water first, launching in the United States in 2012, per Yachting World, which also credited it with speeds in excess of 24 knots; UK and Europe debuts followed in 2014, by which point close to 100 had been built to the strict one-design rules. It was the unanimous winner of Sailing World's 2012 "Overall Boat of the Year" and "Best One Design" awards, as well as Sail magazine's 2012 "Best Boat" award, and has since built fleets across five continents. The VX Evo followed as what Sail Magazine called an evolution of the VX One — itself, per the same magazine, descended from the Viper 640 — and won Sailing World's Boat of the Year award in 2017, the year it launched. A third model, the VX Two, extends the range without a new hull: Mackay Boats builds it in New Zealand on a hull identical to the VX Evo's, reconfiguring only the deck for an intermediate doublehanded skiff crew in place of the Evo's single sailor, and rigging it with carbon-tube spars assembled by Mackay.
Who VX is for
The VX One suits sailors chasing two-to-three-person sport-keelboat racing within a tightly controlled one-design fleet, trailerable enough to move between regattas. The VX Evo is built for the singlehanded asymmetric-dinghy sailor who wants a boat engineered for a long competitive life, while the VX Two extends that same appeal to an intermediate doublehanded skiff crew. Whichever model, the same two yards stand behind it: Bennett called Ovington "a no-brainer choice," saying "they stand by their product and they know how to build a good boat, without question." Mackay Boats' John Clinton, who took on the VX range's design rights in 2024, described the VX One as a boat that "brings together sailors from every corner of the sport that share a passion for fast, one-design sailing" — in his words, "a game changer for people wanting to enjoy a modern, fast, high performance, one-design dinghy, both on a racecourse or going for a sail."
