FOND DU LAC, Wis. June 27, 2007 – Veteran tunnel boat racer Tim Seebold of Osage Beach, Mo., driving a Mercury Champ EFI race outboard-powered tunnel race boat of his own design, won the twentieth annual Dobson Industrial Bay City River Roar Sunday, June 24, in Bay City, Mich. The race was the second round of the 2007 ChampBoat Racing Series presented by Mercury Racing. The win marks Seebold’s 20th career victory in the competitive Champ class, and his first in 10 races - dating back to his last win in St. Louis in 2005.
“We worked hard all weekend to get this boat right,” stated Seebold. “We spent a long time switching things around on the bottom of the boat, at least four times trying to get this right on the 2006 hull, and it worked today,” Seebold said.
Course conditions challenged the skills and conditioning of competitors as they pushed their equipment to the limit for 50-laps around a four-pin, 1.25 mile course sandwiched between two sea walls.
Pole sitter Todd Bowden of Los Angeles led from the start and weaved his way through traffic until a power trim failure, with 30-laps completed, provided Seebold an opportunity to capture the lead.
The race was stopped on lap 40 when Wyatt Nelson of Syracuse, N.Y., crashed trying to pass defending ChampBoat Series champion Terry Rinker of Tampa, Fla.
Seebold bolted into the lead on the restart and maintained his position in the final 10-laps to capture his second Bay City victory in the last three years, and his first 2007 ChampBoat Series victory.
Series points leader, Chris Fairchild, held off Shaun Torrente on the final 10 laps to cinch 2nd place. “We were doing what we could to stay in the top three and it happened for us today. We are going into the next race in St. Louis with a lot of confidence and want to keep these results going,” Fairchild said.
Shaun Torrente, Lynn Simburger and Mark Major rounded out places 3-5. All were powered by Mercury Champ EFI race outboards.
Champ2/SST 120
Defending Champ2 champion Kris Shepard of Antioch, Ill., led the 30-lap Champ2 final from start-to-finish. Texas’ Glynn Matthews finished second, with pole sitter Kevin Ladd of Whitemore Lake, Mich., rounding out third. All were powered by Mercury SST 120 race outboards.
Round three of the 2007 ChampBoat Grand Prix Series is the Bud Light Grand Prix of St. Louis, Aug. 4-5, on Creve Coeur Lake in St. Louis, Mo.
Additional information can be found on the official Web site for the ChampBoat Series:
www.champboatracing.com.
Released: 06/27/2007-RM
