Pete B

you got it there, they need more cameras on the course, when the helo follows at the same speed it takes away form the speed the boat is going.with the courses in close more camera views will give a better show.

Ben@SRP

This is true. The helicopters that are flying above the boats, make the boat seem like it going slow but when there is a camera on a dock or turn/buoy, the boat seems like its flying. How about several barges placed around the course with cameras on them to add to the helicopters filming?

Panther

Very true!! The races these days have 5-10 minutes of actual race footage and 40 minutes of BS in the beginning and at the end..

Show the race start to finish in all the classes, not this highlight BS.. Bill paid $10K that year to get some Media and TV exposure the only real footage we got was one or two announcements and you guys won a championship. Where's our John Force of boat racing?? If our company name was on the TV screen a little more we would have been much happier. It wasn't JK's fault, it's just how it was.

Dangerous Dave

If offshore racing was to really work as a spectator friendly (and bigtime TV deal) heres what you need:

2 classes Cat and V... Period.

Motors: cubic inch limit and spec intake... Period, Let some of these bigtime engine builders show what they can do. (Hendrick motorsports?)

Full time Paid Drivers, full time paid crews

16 races, 8 Freshwater 8 Saltwater per season (every other weekend from April to October)

A very very very large financial backer with a huge TV deal and the TV has to be live. Maybe Exxon Mobil should sponsor this. We use enough of their gas.

As professional as OSS is theres still to many classes. If you don't know the boats and classes it still becomes all mixed up. How many of you have to narrate to you're friends and explain why that boat is in front of that one but the one behind is in first in a different class. SBI puts on a good super V show, at least theres not too many other boats in the way.

How many years have we been trying to run 10 different classes together. I wonder why NASCAR doesn't run the Nextel cars and the Busch cars at the same time?

JohnS

The acrobatics of small boats in big water is always fun to watch (but then again, I'm bias).
I think the most common problem with the sport as far as spectators go, is they don't really know who is racing who. They see all the boats lined up at the start, they take off for the first pin and thats about all the COMPETITION they see. The classes start spreading out on the course and larger boats are sometimes running with smaller boats, its hard to read the number panel to make the P-4 or P-3 class distinction. That is, if the spectator even knows there are several classes.
There should be some kind of easily recognizable color identifier. One color for each class, each boat should exhibit it roughly in the same place and can be seen from shore. Then at least the spectators can see competition regardless of boat type, conditions...etc...

BAJA WILL

From a spectators view, I alway loved the F1 and F2 boats, found them to be much more entertaining than watching the "Big Guns" , I loved the idea that I could buy the same motor and did as the one they were racing. Using the closed canopy is like building a stock car, yea at one time they were stock but not today???

Just my opinion

WILL

THEJOKER

This is all good info, keep it coming! I DO THINK fans would rather watch spec racing , open cockpit boats! Yes it's dangerous but what form of racing isn't? Wouldn't a 25 grand 1st place check get the dust kicked off some really good boats that are now sitting? Slower speeds , rougher water , open cockpits and much better broadcasting would make it very appealing to many! Just my opinion and like I said it's just a poll!

stinger312

Again look at this, they had it right 22 years ago why not now?
this still gives me goose bumps to watch, imagine watching this in HI DEF


http://media.boatmad.com/gallery/v/m...che_2.wmv.html

onesickpantera

iTrader: (1)

In person MAYBE I would rather watch the big boats. On TV with good coverage I would much rather watch the open cockpit boats out in the bigger water. IMO Speedwake had good coverage. Much better than OLN.

BRUCE SEROFF

Speedvision was Awesome race coverage....OLN was a Fountain infomercial paid for by Reggie