NEWS

Event 24.03.12

The weather was cool and the boats were running hot at the last event .  The chosen track direction was tricky to say the least.  The track direction started with a fast run down through the chicane and around the speed bowl to channel number 9 which the boats were entering at full speed, then the track became complicated weaving through the islands and crossing over wakes.  It was a “thinker’s” track and it was a track that demanded enormous skill to get through quickly and cleanly.  It was a thinker’s track because it was hard to remember the track direction and it was complicated.  It was a track where the drivers had to really think about their boat setup, their lines through corners and where to sacrifice speed for boat stability.  I for one like tracks like this where it is about skill and not about a flat out drag race around the track.  It took a few of the drivers and navigators a few qualifying runs to memorise the track as was apparent by the number of wrong ways early on, but after the third qualifier I don’t think there were many mistakes made at all.  I expected there to be a number of “offs” during the event, especially as the event went into the final rounds and the drivers pulled out all stops.  I thought this because there was a lot of wash/wakes and the boats were fairly unstable in a number of areas, especially on the home run where they went down through the middle of the track at high speed.  Yet again I say it’s a credit to the drivers and crews as there were very few “offs” other than a few minor spins.

The EFI Class saw Jo Wilson and Michelle Cox having trouble all night with their boat set up which saw it hopping all over the place every time it got into messy water.  Jo had to really work over time all event to keep the boat in the water.   So many times we saw him very nearly on the bank due to the boat being so unstable as he went into and out of corners.  Unfortunately in the elimination round when it most counted Jo span out which saw him and Michelle uncharacteristically eliminated leaving Simon and the beautiful Simone in “Quality Time” easy winners.   Simon has had a lot of input from Geoff and Jaimee Welch over the last couple of events with the setup of his boat and also with driving tips which has seen Simon become more aggressive and a lot quicker and on the track which is great .  Unfortunately it wasn’t  “Sons of Anarchy” event as they had to retire in the last qualifying round with engine problems.  Up until their retirement both drivers were on the pace and were putting pressure on the field.

In the restricted class it was a two team event driving the same boat.  Once again it was Dad versus Son in “Hammer” with the rivalry again surfacing and both of them racing to their utmost ability.  Unfortunately for Dennis (Dad) he was running behind schedule driving his Semi Trailer back from Lancelin so didn’t get to the event until dinner break which meant he had just two qualifying runs to qualify for the eliminations.  As there were only two competitors all he had to do was complete one lap in the right direction and he would automatically qualify.  Well guess what? Dennis with Kylie his navigator didn’t get the first qualifier right, they went the wrong direction which saw a lot of pressure fall back onto Dennis as he only had one more qualifier and if he got that wrong he was out!  Kylie was not too pleased with him after their first run through as I overheard her saying to Dennis “Bloody listen to me will you”!  What she probably meant to say was “will you watch my bloody hand directions”! (Kyl’s, it’s a bit difficult to hear someone in a Jet Sprint boat!) .  After the Dinner break Adam was invited to have a drive of boat 54 “UONIT” as he had let it be known that he would love to have a drive of a “Group A” boat with the view of talking his dad and sponsors into buying one for the new season.  To say Adam was blown away by the experience would be an understatement!  When he got out of the boat after his drive he was beaming and all he could say was that is bloody awesome, that was amazing, I loved it, I want one! .  Just to put Adams run into perspective he drove his lap at probably not much more than half throttle so to see him so excited by the boats performance after stepping out of a Restricted boat gives you some idea of the difference between the “Group A” and the “Restricted” class.  Later in the event I interviewed Dennis (Dad) and asked him about the possibility of seeing Adam and himself driving a “Group A” boat in the coming season?  His reply was that there was every possibility!  When I asked if they would be putting “Hammer” up for sale he was adamant that they would be keeping that boat on the water as well, thus becoming a two boat team like a number of other crews.  I reckon there is going to be an Old Blokes boat and a young Blokes boat!
Adam won the night by just a second from his Dad, so great effort Dennis to get up to speed and put pressure on Adam when you only had two qualifying runs for the entire event .

“Group A” was an enormous night of racing.  The event started with all drivers and navigators being a little tentative towards the track until Tony Carr came out in “Crazy AZ 07” and put down a time three seconds faster than anyone else.  I’m thinking that Tony was obviously still really savage at himself for making a slight mistake and crashing out of the placings in the event prior so he was making a statement to the guys who beat him in that event by smacking down a fast time right away!
It took a couple of laps for all the “Group A” drivers to settle in but by the third round it was unbelievable as the top five boats were all running 60 second passes.  The boats that were not on the 60 second pace were spread from there back to the 63 second mark and improving, so everyone was on the pace and it was clear it was going to be a close night of racing.  With the track direction being such that the boats had three very fast long straight stretches at different stages of the lap with each fast straight suddenly turning into a number of twisting and complicated turns mixed with a lot of messy water, if there was ever going to be an event where there was going to be a very spectacular crash, this was the one.  The boats that were sitting on the 60 second mark until the eliminations were Tony Carr in “CrazyAz 07” with Gavin Imrie navigating, Peter Rullo in boat 54 “UONIT ” with Judy Ellison navigating, Nigel Johnson in boat 55 “Weapon of Choice” with I’m not sure who navigating, Glen Chapman (Chappo) in boat 26 “Wolverine” with Sharon Perham navigating and Rod Wood in boat 23 “Triple XXX ” with Peter Perham navigating.  Wade Davies in boat 94 “Excalibur ” with Geoff Steel navigating was having boat handling problems earlier on that saw the boat skipping and jumping coming out of the corners but surprisingly he was still putting in good times.  They finally managed to sort the handling out at the start of the elimination rounds only to have the boat develop fuel problems which saw them having to put the boat on the trailer and retire from the event – bad luck you guys.  One of the last runs that Wade did I happened to be standing alongside his very pregnant daughter when Wade came out of a very fast corner and ran wide looking like he was going to hit the tires sideways at a very high speed which would have resulted in a massive crash.  I thought his daughter was going to have the baby on the spot as she covered her face and let out a very audible groan mixed with the word nooooooo!  I must admit I tensed up as well expecting to see a big roll over and possibly a cart wheel or two, but somehow Wade managed to pull the boat out of the Kamikaze direction it was heading and got back into the middle of the channel.  Wades daughter and I just looked at each other and both said to each other “my god that was close”!  (No we didn’t, we both looked at each other with terror in our eyes and said “%@#ing hell that was %@#ing close”!)  I don’t think Wade has any idea how close he was to wiping out in a big way, but then again it is exactly the same in every Jet Sprint boat competing, they are all millimetres and split seconds of a massive crash if they make the slightest skill error, that’s the thrill of it all!
Rod Woods hit the track in his new boat “Tripple XXX ” with the oldest competing navigator Peter Perham alongside of him (There Pete I told you I would let everyone know) .  This boat has won the Australian championships twice so needless to say it is very quick.  His crew were a little worried so what they did to slow Rod down and make him get used to the boat was set the throttle so that no matter how hard Rod pushed on the pedal he could get no more than 60% of the throttle range.  After watching Rod do his first and second pass I think this was a very good idea .  “Triple XXX” is a Sprintec Hull the same as “UONIT” and both the “CrazyAz” boats.  These boats are extremely accurate and go exactly where you point them where other Sprint boat Hulls may have some drift through the corners, or they may have a fraction of lag time as they are steered into a corner.  Rod who has been “B” driving “Wolverine” which is a locally built Tomcat hull was always going to find the Sprintec “Tripple XXX” a hell of a lot different.  The “Tomcat” hull slides a little in corners and it also has a little lag time as you steer into a corner which is not a bad thing at all, in fact it makes for a very comfortable drive that is a little forgiving.  For those of us who watched Rod’s very first lap it was scary to say the least!  It very nearly ended on the very first turn through the chicane where I’m guessing that Rod turned to set the boat up for the coming corner some three meters out from the actual corner as he would have in “Wolverine” expecting some slide and a split second of lag time before the boat actually started to turn, but as Sprintecs do it turned immediately and suddenly he was looking directly at the bank three meters before the corner – good save Rod, it was nearly your first time on the bank in your new boat mate!   It is very obvious to us all that once Rod gets the hang of this boat and his crew give him 100% throttle he is going to be immediately challenging for first place.

Once the Eliminations were reached it saw three boats, “CrazyAz 07”, “Weapon of Choice” and “UONIT” racing in the same second.   We had also seen a couple of high 59 second passes from these guys which was amazingly quick for such a difficult track.  In the top six run off in the eliminations disaster struck for Nigel in “Weapon of Choice” with a lot of blue smoke in the air as he flew around the track early in his pass, eventually though he had to take his foot off the throttle and coast back to the pits as it was very apparent his motor was shot. (Diagnosis – it’s believed he has burnt a hole in a piston)
To say he was upset once he got back to the pits would be an understatement as he threw his gloves, helmet, neck brace and balaclava into the back of his four-wheel drive and stormed off away from everyone so he could cool down.  Suddenly it had become a race between Tony in “CrazyAZ 07”, Peter in “UONIT” and Chappo in “Wolverine”.  Chappo had not looked comfortable with the track all night.  Watching him you could just sense that he was missing that little bit of confidence which is very unusual for him.  On interviewing him in the pits and saying this to him he admitted he was struggling with the track and just couldn’t get his head in the right spot.  In the top three, the final run off for places, Chappo openly admitted that there was no way he was going to catch Tony or Peter so he said it was time for a fast but safe run to lock away third place and then he was going to sit back and see if one, or possibly both Tony and Peter made a mistake and eliminated themselves thus elevating him a place or two – not a bad strategy!  Tony was second out in the top three and absolutely blew the track away in “CrazyAz 07” coming back with a time of 59.39 seconds, his fastest time of the night and the fastest time anyone had done all night.  On rushing to Tony to interview him as he put the boat back on the trailer I found him ecstatic, totally out of breath and shaking like a leaf.  There was no doubt he had given it his best!  All he could say to me was that the run was awesome, it was perfect so it was now up to Pete to pull one totally out of the bag if he was to beat him.  Well as Peter Rullo and Judy Ellison often do in “UONIT”, they went out there with a ton of pressure and the knowledge that they had to throw caution completely to the wind and drive a lap that was going to be totally out there, in short Pete had to drive the lap of his life!  During his lap he messed up two corners fractionally and when I say fractionally I mean hundredths of a second were lost and to everyone on the bank it looked like it was going to be all about Tony Carr in “CrazyAz 07” being the winner.  But from nowhere Peter and Judy managed to make up those hundredths of seconds and flew through the finish line with a time of 59.29!  It was an amazing lap, in fact both Peter and Tony’s laps were amazing with nothing between them and at the end of the event the best driver won, there is no doubt about that!  So look out this event as I am sure Tony in CrazyAz 07”, Nigel in “Weapon of Choice”, Chappo in “Wolverine” and Rod in “Triple XXX” are going to be out there with something to prove.  I’m sure that Wade Davies in “Excalibur” and Adam Mileham in “Short Fuse” will be pushing the field as well as they sort their boats a bit more each event and get that bit closer to a placing.

Many thanks to the Volunteers, the people in the timing tower, the Mud Rats, the Pit Boss and the Rescuer (Tow Boat). There are a couple of other  volunteers that we as a club are all terribly grateful too and that is the husband and wife team down on the entry to the event.  These guys do a tremendous job and really do deserve a big pat on the back from us all! They are an awesome pair doing a job that many don’t want to do due to the fact that you can’t see the event from down where they are.  To all you spectators who come along to our event – please always give Dawn and Michael a great big G’day and a cheery smile!   We love ya Dawn and Michael!

The Roving Mic