Can certain pirates run faster than others?

[Edward Edgemenace]

No, as of today, windcatcher has not been fixed. The spent skill points do save you some grief: NPC ships shoot behind you, instead of at you, if you unlock windcatcher. But your ship's actual speed increase was taken away when they released SvS.

Pirate running speed is a function of network latency, local computer limitations (especially video card) and graphics options settings. Other than that, all pirates run at the same speed. Explains why I was about 10 minutes behind the winners of the "Feats of Strength" contest. :-)