If ever there were an aptly named yacht, it’s the Sunseeker Predator 75. At rest, it has the purposeful look of a raptor straight from Jurassic Park. A striking midnight-gray hull and rakish lines only add to this effect.
As the sound of turbos spooled up on the optional 1,900 hp MAN V-12s (1,550s are standard), I couldn’t wait to see what this yacht could do. Sunseeker’s captain grabbed a handful of throttles and shoved them to the pins. We shot out of the inlet at Fort Lauderdale, Florida, as though we had launched from a slingshot. The Predator 75 with this engine package is capable of 40 knots in decent conditions, which we didn’t have; the Gulf Stream was delivering an endless chain of 3- and 4-footers, so the best we saw was 33 knots. But the yacht seemed as though it had seen prey on the horizon, and it shrugged off the square-edged seas with impunity.
Then I realized that Sunseekers are built on the edge of the English Channel, whose seas the Gulf Stream can’t touch for being just plain ugly. The yacht was leveraging its hull form’s 20-degree transom deadrise and fine entry to slice and dice our way through. The captain used the windshield wipers only once, after a particularly big hole in the ocean.
Also notable is that the Predator 75 is more than just quick and seaworthy. It is luxurious and well laid out for entertaining and cruising.
