Rumor has it that the National champion in Superboat Limited "Bank Beaters" owned and throttled by Doug Kelley was busted cheating at the New York race Yesterday. Bank Beaters ran away from every boat in his class in the first 30 seconds of the race including the Apba AND SBI Kilo Record holder Zipp Express. Now here is where the problem comes in. Bank Beaters has #6 drives which kicks butt in rough water but is Much slower in flat water which New York was. Spectators said Bank Beaters was keeping up with the Super cats. Now remember these boats all raced against each other all season. Every flat water race Bank Beaters came in last. After the race Doug Kelly of Bank Beaters was confronted by one of the other racers regarding his new "Freakish Speed". Immedatly Doug Kelly took his boat from the wnners circle, without getting his flag for winning the race, without getting his TV interview regarding the race and being the Winner for National points and 2002 SBI Champion (Doug kelly never misses a second of attention) so the boat couldn't be inspected. an argument went on between Doug Kelley and ALL of the other racers in the class for about 3 hours. Doug would not let anyone inspect his boat! Finally John Carbonell SBI President put his foot down and confiscated dougs EFI boxes which are rumored to "Look Altered". It's really Very low for a guy too cheat espically in a class like Superboat limited where all of the racers in the class are supposibly friends. I feel if Doug is found to be cheating he should be suspended from attending worlds and the title go to the second place boat. Who knows how long this has been going on! Im glad i'm not racing in that class or I would be pissed! I'll just stay in my liittle single engine race boat and let the rich guys fight it out.

It is sad to see guys do that. I mean how satisfying can it be to know you won but you cheated? I guess we will have to ask Regie about that Lets just hope it was a HUGE missunderstanding.

Jon

What is SBI's post race inspection procedure?

It is a shame. I want to commend John Carbonell for inforcing the right to protest and confiscate the questionable EFI boxes even after Doug kelley fought for 3 hours not to let anyone inside his engine hatches. I'm glad he's trying to keep the class honest. That's the only way we can get more races to attend SBI events!

The SBI inspection procedure is before the race they do an engine inspection to see if seals are broken and if all components look factory. They mark the efi boxes ech race in differant color nail polishes to see if they have been changed. After the race they inspect again and sometimes Dyno the first 3 boats. Every racer knows this is how it works, we all agree to this when we signed p for SBI. How or why would you refuse an after race inspection if you are the winner? If your doing things the right way wouldn't you want to prove it? Wouldn't gladly submit to this rountine inspection UNLESS you knew you were cheating!

I'm not sure what this is supposed to mean since Zipp has had some unfortunate problems lately with breaking. They've broken in the last three races I've seen them in, Deerfield, Cleveland, and New York, so I don't know how the fact that Zipp lost to Doug proves anything.

Seems like SCL Inboard is pretty bad for this with the winners being accused of cheating (seems like Kiely was constantly being accused last year over in APBA of cheating), and that's part of the reason some of the guys moved to SBI to begin with because their rules were so much more lax and not changing every year.

Larry Goldman said that they were showing 106 mph in their 35 Motion and Bankbeaters blew by them!. #6's suck up hp. The boat was left in the water at the crane and was not allowed to be moved or touched. The SBI volunteers wouldn't let anyone near it.

Yes, Zipp has had problems. But was running at 106 MPH when he was stomped on by Bank Beaters. Maybe he is dialed in BUT why would you deny an inspection if your not doing anything wrong?! Every other boat in the class opened their haches and invited the inspection to prove they were ligit. Everyone but Doug.
Every man desreves his dat in court but to do that he has to show up to court.

So, he wasn't caught cheating. Right! Aren't we waiting for SBI to inspect the boxes and come up with a determination? Isn't this what protesting is for?

what ever happened to innocent until proven guilty??? i'm not much for rumors and hearsay...let the officials sort it out and report the facts.