My thinking is I would not be afraid of buying a composite built boat, as the core materials are lighter than the balsa or plywood on a racing boat. I would carefully inspect the boat builder and their record. I would inspect the boat with an eye for structural condition. Damage (crashes during racing) would be repaired in much the same way as a traditional FRP (fiberglass hull) boat. The outer skin is often a fiberglass skin. Now a days you may find that the boat skin is carbon fiber or kevlar rather than traditional woven fiberglass. The techniques used to repair these more exotic fibers can sometimes inhibit the DIY boat owner.
There are a number of good articles about marine construction discussing the concepts involved.
from Boat Magazine - Boat Construction Comparison...
Talk about an area of contention over the years...core materials are it. Cores, including foams and balsa wood, are good materials. It is the way they are installed that can make them an owner’s nightmare. Today, improvements in closed molding techniques, like resin infusion, have bettered the quality of core installation. In the hand-laid days, a good installation was like pinning the tail on the donkey. Builders were blindfolded because they couldn’t see the “downside” of the core. The vacuum infusion process has improved core installations, performance and longevity. Both balsa and foam cores can be well produced and last for years. In terms of performance, a cored or sandwich composite is better than a solid composite with respect to strength-to-weight ratio. Cored composites yield lighter, faster and more fuel-efficient boats.
Do not be afraid of buying a new boat made with core materials, but do your homework in selecting your brand and what is behind it. And, FYI, most of those windmill blades you see spinning on the distant peaks are built using vacuum infusion with cored composites.