Originally Posted by TGOR

My only fear about boat shows is displays usually cost money just to get in the door. I did the Ft Lauderdale boat show with Challenger Powerboats and I'm glad they paid for it...they spent a lot of $$$ for their display area.

As for the air shows I've mentioned, I've got an inside line and there's no cost for displays. I'll most likely do both shows myself, but I think a "mini dry pit" area will draw a larger crowd. Not to mention, I'm the air boss for one of the shows, so I won't be able to hang out by the boat to hand out info.

Sean

Originally Posted by FunHome

I've been pondering about this for a long time, but since the Hollywood Race where I saw some things that got me thinking again of ways to help our sport go to the "next level". Here are my thoughts,
I think it is all about “The Show” no matter weather you are at a Monster Truck Show, Nascar Race, Friday night circle track racing, or the Superbowl. So what can we do to help our sport be more interesting, fun, and easier to watch?? I’m not going to get into another debate about classes; I just want to work with what we’ve got.

- First I think we all (in SBI) should have SUPERBOAT.COM in BIG readable letters on our boats, preferably somewhere you can see it when it is on its trailer heading to and from an event, on both sides and on the back. I know we are all required to have the SBI triangle sticker, but I believe that is mostly for the TV cameras zooming in on us when we are racing. Face it our race Boats are like huge billboards that we drag all over this country and we should use them as such. That way people can go to the site (which is pretty Kick A$$ right now) and see the schedule of who, what, when, and where.
- Then I think AMF is headed in the right direction!! Hollywood was the first race I had seen them in person. The first thing you could see from across the street is that they were having fun. They were putting on a show!! They had music going, lights flashing, Jumbo tron playing, it looked like fun!! Also you could tell right away who the racers were, meaning Scott and Marc where in their full race suits. I also see from their Blog, that they made an appearance at a hospital to visit children (in their race suits) this is the kind of thing we need to do more of to get the attention of the media. We ought to get together and get more teams to do this. Even to the point that teams that show up early and help do site promotion should get a reduced entry fee or something.
- About “the Show”. I know it is difficult to hand out checkered flags on the course and in the production class, you really don’t know who won until the GPS is downloaded. But for the fans we ought to (get a flag in front of them) and pass by as close as possible, meaning have a area predetermined and marked by a buoy of where “Victory Lane” is and where there is plenty of water. From the water everything close to shore looks shallow and from land it all looks deep and like the boats are way out there.
- I think the Racer Parties should be in the pits, and the pits should have more for people to see. For instance High performance boat show, get poker-runners to have their boats on display, or a local club, or a marina, brokerage firm, etc. It should have things for kids to do. Like a play area. Get a local civic group to have this area, they could charge a small fee to cover their expenses and maybe make a little $$ for their cause.
- There should be more promoting, the ad’s we all have heard before with the announcers yelling about motorcross, monster trucks, etc. (THIS WEEKEND ONLY!! FRIDAY SATURDAY AND SUNDAY SUPERBOAT RACES!! DON’T MISS THE PARTY IN THE PITS ON FRIDAY NIGHT, SATURDAY ALL DAY HIGH PERFORMANCE BOAT SHOW, SUPERBOAT TESTING, BATHING SUIT COMPETION, SUNDAY RACES AT 1PM, DON’T MISS IT!! COME SEE THE BIGGEST AND BADDEST BOATS FROM ALL OVER THE COUNTRY!!) We were in Hollywood for the races and stopped in a Napa auto store that was about 2miles from the pits and they didn’t even know about the race.
These are just a couple of ideas and I know some have been incorporated before, but I think we as racers need to help do what we can. Enough for now I need to find some better uniforms (race suits) for my team and order some more stickers, hero cards, etc.!!!
Later,
Brad Harrington
Owner/Throttleman P4-17
D&M Motorsports / Lake Shores Marina
SBI / APBA / UIM World Champions!!!

Originally Posted by Pat D

Re: the Marathon race, if anyone wants to bring their truck/boat in early I'll find a place to display it.......or you can use my dock for whatever.
Just my $.02 pd