Yachtsman With The Smallest ............

The battle for ‘Yachtsman With Smallest Dick’ continues to rage, and this year, Saudi Arabia’s Al-Waleed bin Talal finally gets to beat up on poor Roman Abramovich with the launch of Azzam. Obviously this ain’t the same Azzam that Ian Walker nursed around the world in the last Volvo – nope, at 590 feet, this one is bigger than 100 Volvo boats, and takes over the title once held by Larry Ellison’s Rising Sun as ‘bigggest private yacht in the world’. Umm…wow?

What is impressive – or impressively obscene, anyway – is the price; over $600 million, the speed; over 31 knots, the draft – just 14 feet, and a Lurssen build that took just 3 years – a record for a boat of this size. And how incredibly unimpressive it is to spend so much money on so much opulence entirely because you must have the biggest boat.