Ya Know , Can we race with this new package before we start wanting rule changes!!!!! Jesus Christ! This is the problem with our sport, If we showed up at a nascar event and asked for rule changes because our car wasnt up to speed due to finances or lack of testing or whatever they would say "These are the rules go pond salt"..... Lets try something new.......These are the rules , Build your boat to fit...! Bob could have easily put a new canopy on our boat stayed with our 530s (which did nothing because stroke stayed the same) and saved a crapload of money because they had to Build a new boat, Build the new motors and refit the trailer.... Lets race in Key West and then talk !!!!!!

I am just an outsider looking in and I applaud your statement offshore9. When I heard of this all happening in NYC I saw a potential turn again for the sport but after reading this I can see it is still "AS THE PROP TURNS!!!"

Tony, I would love to see Chris race with us, but the fact of the matter, as you stated, he may not even need a change and the 530's is not the way to go. Realistically the 530's only made a few ft. lbs. of torque over the 510's and the HP change was almost non-existent. He'd be wasting his money. I'm not trying to bust your stones, I just think it took a long time to get this class moving again and some good competitors are stepping up to race. I think we need to stay focused on the new rules and following them.
CRC wanted to race this class with his motors this year and Superboat said no...that's following the rules.

And by the way we didn't destroy our boat ( thanks for the kind words)......we decided to build a boat that fits into this class without the frustration and money of trying to put a round peg in a square hole.

Chris, you know I would always have your back....have a good race in Clearwater....that's always been a great race for you

No problem explain it to him, I just think you need to allow the boats that exist out there as much as possible. No one has built a new race boat in the LAST 6 years for this class. and in this economy used ones are a better deal. Look at what you did bought a used boat...a good value. Anytime weve allowed other boats in its never effected anything... Again we need to entertain it , or at least look at it.

Gary Nichols had a shaft boat, we allowed it with weight it continued to run ,sold and ran more.

Your APACHE wasnt legal for the class the tunnel "tecnically too wide" but all agreed to let you run it.
Then when the performance wasnt there, I personally campaigned for you bigger engines to help. Maybe it didnt help but what else do you do at that point..It did keep you in the game and look where you are.

If you let someone run what they have and they have fun they will probably continue with new product.

I did it myself, bought a boat, wasnt really competitive 2003, rolled it KW 2004, still had fun, 2005 built the first SKATER 38.


Billy and I were a big part of the "no blower rule" adds more of a variable that you cant monitor. And I think I'm pretty well versed runnin against a 850 boat...we had to run ours on the absolute ragged edge, something I probably wont ever do again.

And if it wasnt for guys like myself , Billy Winters and yourself ,and me and Billy ALLOWING the 850s to run our class, oh i forgot we entered our underpowered boats in the 850 class, anything that resembled a SUPERBOAT class probably would of dissolved.

Billy and I went as far as allowing Qatar run Lambos , bigger tunnels and rudders, busted our butts to run with them to try and help the class in 2010. They wanted to do it again in KW ...we said No...we tried it ,it simply didnt work.


PS WHM boat is 10000 lbs out cant get to 9500. Goes to show you as one of the best drivers 500lbs dont mean crap or an additional hp advantage that i see people ***** about...STILL GOT TO DRIVE THE BOAT. Sorry Bob ,didnt mean to be"mean". not much of a "SUGAR COAT" guy at least thats what my wife says

byrider:s on the right track you might have 5 or 6 boats at the 1st race but after a stuff or engine failures or a boat or two doesn;t show up your right back to a two or three boat class towards the end of the season i think the goal would be to start with as many boats as possabile and get this class going again

Surprised the rules are so relaxed, even the old 750 Supercat class had dedicated ci, cam and head spec, carb cfm limitations, etc etc. If anything I would have thought they would have mandated smaller power (525s) with all the accidents last year. This should make for some interesting competition between the engine manufacturers which is always interesting to follow.

I'm sure Champion Performance (Joe Soller and Ed Michaels from Sterling) would want in if anyone's looking to build new power. For reference they built me a motor that would actually fall well under the SBI spec and made 698hp with just 489", worked small Brodix supercat heads, smaller cam for driveability, wet sump, etc. With these new rules big #s (relatively speaking) should be no problem.

Making 800+hp will be the norm in this class likely closer to 850 so should be interesting to see how things shake out in Key West this year. Hope to see a big turnout like years past.

All in all , the rules are not really relaxed, still have cid and comp parameters, heads are the same,cam limited to 720 lift ,any carb.and 7000 rpm. Fantastic your correct its a very "nice" package someone can build easily , all builders can easily handle this. Currently we have Sterling, Scorpian, CCperformance(old United from Miami) and another builder(im not at liberty to disclose) who builds fantastic pleasure motors ,and who is on OSO looking to do some. I see brian you have been to a few races. Look Im not wanting to change anything, I would love to sit back and watch it just happen. I think like anything you have to push the initial excitement to expand it more quickly. After much resistance and conversations I have begged Tom Abrams to make available his Reliable Carriers MTI. Its one of the fastest ever built and would love to have it out there racing ( I would love Tom to run it ,but he is extremely busy) and he supports the new class entirely. This boat is ready to rolland listed on OSO.(yesterday). Maybe BIG BOY WINTERS can get his out too. KW will be very interseting, so will the winter.

Be cool to see you and Winters out racing together.

Here it is, now someone just has to pony up the $$$

http://www.offshoreonly.com/classifi...o47813-en.html


I didn't realize there were more to the rules (spec heads, max lift, etc). That makes more sense than strictly max ci/rpm I thought it was. Should be cool to see how things shake out. Still wish it was power to weight like most the european classes, but this is still a step in the right direction for sure.

Now they just need to bring back A-class for us common folk lol

Great Job and best of luck to all the team that have worked so hard with SBI to make this finally happen. Look forward to watching some great racing in KW.