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Offshore race to be earlier

SARASOTA COUNTY -- Organizers of the 2004 Sarasota Offshore Showdown powerboat races are planning to hold the event earlier next year.

The competition will be May 14-16, two weeks before Memorial Day and two months before the longstanding Fourth of July Grand Prix races off Lido Beach. It will mark the beginning of the American Power Boat Association's season.

The race will again be held off Siesta Key Beach and will again benefit the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.

This year's event marked the return of the APBA, which sanctions high-speed and national-circuit powerboat races, to Sarasota after a two-year absence.

The last weekend in August was the only available weekend this year for the APBA, said race chairman Anthony Puccio. It was in the middle of hurricane season, and it had been raining almost daily. Puccio cited the weather as the main reason for the date change.

"We really were fortunate and blessed that we were not rained out," he said. With the May date, "We might even have more boats."

For years APBA sanctioned the Suncoast Offshore Grand Prix, a July fund-raiser for the Suncoast Foundation for the Handicapped. The relationship ended in 2001.

Good news.

We are looking forward to another great race in Sarasota.

I thought Daytona Beach was the season opener for the APBA?

Hope they make it happen.

That should come as a surprise to the Ministry of Tourism for the Bahamas!

From the ABPA website:
"When our previously scheduled North American Championships for the Grand Bahamas, hosted by the Ministry of Tourism, was moved from September 27th - 30th, to a new date of April 16th - 18th, 2004. . ."