Iggy

Back in "The Old Days" the Point Pleasant N.J. race was 4+ hours long. They started at the entrance to the Manasquan Inlet, raced around a short course then headed out to Long Island N.Y. and back to Manasquan Inlet. Once out of sight they would throttle back and run together. Once in view of spectators they'd throttle up and race again. Those races were more of an endurance run. And the boats were more like floating fuel tanks.

Panther

Life changes, we move along...

Those OPA boys sure are on to something though!

Panther

The point I was originally making almost 4 years ago , until it turned into a play on words, is things were much different. Whether it be good or bad the jury is still out.

Back when these guys were racing my father would pull along side the race boats running WFO while my mother was taking pictures with a telephoto lense at 70 mph. (now we know where Lucididee got idea from) It was very different times. These days I have to park my boat like a 1/4 mile away watching the race thru binoculars, unless I'm a turn boat or safety boat... It seems the days of riding the boat down to watch the races are over for me because I can't enjoy it as much anymore (my opinion)....

FeverMike

I got pretty close watching in Sarasota on my boat. You can thank the insurance industry, law suit happy people for changing the times. Driving up beside a race boat is not a wise decesion today or yesterday and I still stand with my comment....if boats race offshore like the old days none of you would see ANTYHING...at least with today's courses you can see something.

Panther

That's your opinion and you're entitled to it...

Lucididee

I guess you are lucky in Sarasota to be able to get close enough to watch.

And I guess you've never been to the race in NY on the hudson. And come to think of it, most of the NJ races aren't spectator friendly. Watching from a boardwalk up to 1/4 mile away from the ocean doesn't give you much to really see. And Atlantic City was the worst to watch the race. Mind you, it never stopped me from going and won't, but it has stopped some from the area of going to the races, and it is hard to get new people to go to them as well. Back in the day it was more spectator friendly. As memory serves me correctly (I could be wrong) there was never any probs/accidents that occured to any spectator boats.

Lucididee

Why I ortta ........... I'm gonna ...............

You have an interest in 2nd place?

phragle

iTrader: (3)

anybody remeber mickey thompson?? he took desert racing, and put it inside a stadium, that way 50 thousand people could watch at once, but it wasnt desert racing, it was stadium short course..with specialized vehicles designed to go around a tight course with some jumps and whoops and desert racing existed as a seperate sport..in desert racing..who is gonna see you in the middle of nowhere going balls out at 3 am?? nobody..but its not about that..its about man vs. machine vs. desert vs. the other guy..to finish first, first you have to finish...how about adding a good long distance offshore race to a series.. just one race amongst many regular spectator friendly races and see who can put a boat together that can go the distance and see if the throttleman and driver are good enough to go fast enough to win yet slow enough not to tear the boat up, make it a double points race or yet another idea, in my desert racing area we had a world endurance championship every 2 years ( 2 years is good..it takes a year to forget how much hell the last race was then a year to get ready for the next one) a long race with pits, say sarasota to key west to miami to bahamas..a perpetual trophy for the king of the waves... make for good advertising/bragging rights for the sponsors if there product holds up and wins, makes for some good dockside racing stories and would really show off the caliber of the competitors and there equipment, allways use the same course year after year and you have the world offshore endurance championships dont you think a full page magazine add with say reggie or mike or anybody else standing next to there boat with big letters saying the the world offshore endurance champion, "you want a fast solid dependable boat that will stand up to anything davey jones can throw at it??, this is the SAME hull, the SAME motors, the SAME drives that can be you next boat!!" think about it.....

Panther

I like the concept and idea!!!

Also, AMF Television had some excellent footage, they're on to something there as well. The old speedvision footage was crappy IMHO... To many cllips and not enough racing...if I wanted to see a highlight show that I would watch one.... We sponsored a race boat one year and thought we would get some media exposure but the .00005 seconds you could see the boat was a waste of $10g's.

GARBAGEMAN

HEY PHRAGLE I THINK IT SOUNDS COOL. I DON'T THINK IT WOULD BE A DOUBLE POINTS THING THOUGH THAT WOULD BE TO MUCH $$$ BURDEN ON TEAMS TRYING TO SET UP THERE BOATS FOR LONG DISTANCE. I WOULD LOVE TO SEE IT LIKE AN IROC EVENT. THE TOP FIVE OR TEN TEAMS FROM EACH SANCTIONING BODY GET INVITED