With some things, bigger is not always better, and naval architect [Ward Setzer][] thinks sport-fishing boats are among them. That’s why he stopped adding length overall when he hit 124 feet on the Global Fish.
“This boat still has to have Carolina flare and tumblehome at the transom,” he says. “Scaling up those proportions is like scaling up a Picnic Boat. It gets out of hand. I think we may have hit the magical balance here.”
Setzer conceived the 124-footer after working on 118-foot versions for clients in Australia and New Zealand, where there is demand for larger sport-fishing yachts that can chase big game across the South Pacific. When the global economy rebounded, he realized there may be U.S. clients too, and he reached out to Donald L. Blount and Associates for input.
“We compared notes, and they were getting the inquiries as well,” Setzer says. Motoryacht owners wanted to move down; sport-fish owners wanted to move up. A vision was born, with Blount doing naval architecture and Setzer drawing the rest.
The 124 Global Fish had a soft premiere via video at October’s Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show, and Setzer says that, if she’s not in build by fall 2015, show-goers can expect a larger promotion. The target client may want to fish the boat, or he may simply use her as a luxury support vessel.
“It has the accommodations of something more like a 115-foot raised pilothouse,” Setzer says. “It’s a hybrid, in between.”
