Wow, does this boat excite me! What a great way to spend a weekend…

This is a class racer, built to go around a closed course in a defined oval or circle. Its sole purpose is racing: Completing the course better and faster than competing boats within the class rules of the APBA (American Power Boat Association).

Although it might be tempting, don’t plan to use this boat for any other water sports. These boats require exact foot petal and steering input to get on plane from a displacement speed. Even then they just barely make it up. There’s no such thing as an efficient cruising speed, either. It’s designed, balanced, and propped to do just one thing: GO FAST!! And a fast thrill it is.

What's it made out of, fiberglass or wood? That top photo looks like wood at the transom.

Wood.

These boats are hand-made—usually from wood. For speed they need to be as light on the water as the rules allow, yet they also need the durability to withstand the chop of a protected bay along with the wash from another half dozen racers buzzing around together for several laps. Length, weight, and engine size usually define what class this boat races in. Certain safety features are also required and are checked before a boat is allowed in the water.

How you going to blow your hair back with the enclosed cockpit?

Engine/drive system?

I think the helmet will stop the wind too, but no helmet for me for over 20 years.

You used to race these, sb?

Nope. Never a racer on the water. Did skipper the rescue boat though for COBRA (Calif. Outboard Racing Assoc.) for a year, though.

Only had to have the diver go after one racer ( the rescue boat carried a helmsman and a diver that went into the water) and then I had to crank the basket up and skipper that driver to the shoreside Ambulance.

He woke up only after he was on the way to the Hospital.

He was driving a flat bottom race boat that blew over. His boat broke apart.

His safety gear kept his head turned upright and above the water.

Got me really think about the better PFDs from then on.

I bet. What is the engine / drive in that thing?

The boat class pictured uses a 135 to 150 cu. in. engine. Think old Ford flathead, Chevy II, or Ford Falcon gas engines.

That small? So it is completely stripped of all unneccesary weight and has a small draft? does it have a retractable keel for stability in the turns?

I usally think of these and others that look similar to these as Turning Fins.

Straight inboard drive with an offset rudder.

Totally missed that outrigger in the photos earlier. Was looking at the emergency escape.

A race itself typically takes 3 - 10 laps. The boats are already on plane and circling before the race begins. Drivers mash the throttle all the way down, and their first goal is to time it such that their boats cross the START line just as a big clock counts down to zero. The first boat to accomplish that has the best “legal start”. Since the course is a circuit, the start line is also the finish line. The winner must then be the first to cross the line after completing the required distance for that competition.

Penalties for crossing the line too soon.. False starts?

You go around again and thereby lose unless everyone else jumped the start with you. Many drivers try to get a new driver to jump while they just barely make a legal start.

You must make a legal start, i. e., after the clock has started the race.

If you are looking at record speeds, think about 100 mph around the course and about 130 mph for a straightaway record.

If you want to really have a thrill day, this type of boat can give it.

Uh, the "Rescue Pull Pin" was all I needed to know to make up my mind. Think I'll stick to my FW.

Yea, it needs safety stuff.