MANITOU 25 LEGACY SL
Like nearly all Manitous we’ve tested over the years, the 25 Legacy SL featured an ultrasmooth ride and a sporty, inside lean through the corners that’s more akin to a traditional V-hull. Chalk it up to the builder’s patented V-Toon technology. Twin 25-inch pontoons flank a central 27-inch pontoon, dropped lower than the outer tubes. Taking into account the central tube’s added girth, the effect is to lower the bottom of the center pontoon a full 51∕4 inches and mimic a V-hull’s shape. Add the wide, positive-angle lifting strakes of Manitou’s Sport Handling Package on all three tubes, Teleflex SeaStar Power Assist steering and a performance transom design and the result is a boat that powers instantly onto plane, banks sweetly into turns and, with our test boat’s 300 hp Evinrude G3, topped out at over 48 mph.
Manitou carries the performance feel below onto the look and feel of the helm above. Here, a standard 7-inch Garmin touchscreen display is surrounded in the brand’s trademark billet aluminum, an accent that continues with the retaining gate for a padded cellphone tray, onto the propeller-like spokes of the tilt steering wheel and, in more functional fashion, the billet transom.
Elsewhere, optional matte black powder-coat provides a pleasant contrast, coloring the stylish supports for the minimalist glass windscreen, traditional pontoon fencing and Bimini hardware.
While both handling and styling scream performance, the Legacy’s interior is all luxury. Forward, parallel lounges, one 5 feet, 4 inches and the other 5 feet, 10 inches, feature generous thigh bolsters and artistic, quilt-like stitching in the lumbar region. That same stitch pattern is found in the twin captains’ chairs (each with its own flip-up bolster) and on the interior panels of the aft SL lounge. The latter can be set up as a forward-facing bench with rear playpen, forward- or aftfacing recliner, or just one giant 6-foot-8inch by 5-foot-2-inch sun bed.
No less than eight cup holders surround the perimeter. A stereo remote is just an arm’s length away.