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Endurance Race - Day
1
Anzio is the second race of the P1 series.
Near Rome it was a great location and very pretty. However we
arrived to storms and force 7 winds so the racing was going to
get interesting! …
The start of the first
race in Anzio was a short run to a ‘gate’ of a yellow pillar
buoy and a red marker. The pillar buoy being 3 metres in height
and you’d think plenty big enough. We all proceeded out of the
harbour in a procession past the crowds and then out to the
muster area.
The drivers were
slightly concerned about the start. Whereas in Malta there had
been a wide area for the start line, with a long run to the
first buoy thus enabling all the boats to spread out. Here was
the opposite. A short mile and half run in lumpy water to a
narrow gate. This distance was nowhere near enough to allow the
boats to spread before the gate. In addition to this the gate
was in one of the roughest areas of the course where the sea was
a 3 metre beam sea right on the turn. So heading out all of us
were slightly nervous.
Finally the beautiful
starter Cigarette Gladiator put the green flag up and off we
went. I had tried to get a good start to avoid being buffeted by
wash and spry from the other boats. This sort of worked, and I
could just see Martin Lai, Ocean Dragon racing, the evolution
Kerakoll boat and a few others. It was important now to plough
through the sea to get to the gate as one of the first before
all the other 15 or so boats caused a bottleneck.
As usual the Dragon just
flew. She looked after us and just bashed through the growing
waves as if they were not there, running level most of time. All
I could see was white foam but Mike shouted that we were on the
correct line so blindly we continued. Suddenly Mike shouted
‘watch out to the right’. And there was Thuraya veering left
straight towards us. He had nearly turned the wrong way around
one of the markers leading to the gate and came within inches of
us. A swift look over the left shoulder and we swerved to avoid
him. I laughed to myself, it was like dodgems but with huge
great cars!
We were getting nearer
the gate now and I knew the sea was getting rougher. All the
boats were having some very serious ‘airborne’ moments. The
sight of boats like Kerakoll leaping 10 feet into the air was
something I will never forget.
We were due to get to
the gate any second, but the group of us could not see the
buoys. The sea was so big that the yellow pillar buoy was
disappearing. Suddenly we saw the red marker of the gate and
knew that we were at the gate.
We were now at marker
‘C’ the next trick was to turn. All the boats were being
buffeted by the big beam sea and it was essential to keep out of
each others way or you could find a boat on your head! I spotted
a trough, got into it and let the sea turn the boat. She turned
well, a bit bumpy but nothing horrendous (although my helmet did
slam into the side of the boat a few times….thank goodness for
helmets and harnesses!
We rounded the yellow
marker and headed into the most enormous following sea I have
ever been in. Our 39 foot boat was climbing up the waves!
The trick here was not
to let the boat get out of shape. If you got it wrong and
powered off the top then you could land into one of the huge
‘holes’ doing serious damage to the boat. As usual the Dragon
behaving beautifully and provided I kept my foot down she was
flying along quite happily.
We were now heading
towards buoy ‘E’ powering through the sea and still managing to
stick to about 60 mph. In a weird way it was quite enjoyable!
What was stunning was seeing the larger more powerful boats of
the Evolution Class being buffeted about as much as we were!
The next turn buoy E was
another difficult turn in big water and again you had to turn
the boat according to the sea conditions avoiding any large
crests which could topple the boat uncomfortably on her side.
The boats were now beginning to spread out more. Martin Lai was
just ahead and driving hard, with ourselves keeping the pressure
on and Flanders Offshore the 33 foot RIB third. They were doing
an incredible job in a boat very similar to our previous RIB
which was a challenge in those seas.
The next leg was the
longest from ‘E’ to ‘F’. The conditions were still following but
at a slight angle again meaning that it was important to keep an
eye on the waves. At one point we caught a very large one riding
up the side at an angle, which was rather unpleasant!
We kept Martin in our
sights, we were driving a hard race and his Formula whilst
performing incredibly well, was spending a lot of the time
airborne.
All the while we were
racing in this incredible sea the helicopter kept around the
boats filming what must have been some incredible footage of
these amazing boats just being pounded by the power of the sea.
We rounded ‘F’ and sea
was flattening out where it was sheltered by the harbour. My
favourite turn was A and A1. If you got the approach right you
could almost ‘slingshot’ the boat around the corner and then
make sure you had the power and acceleration to come out the
turn ready for the leg from A to B, and then gate C. I am still
getting used to driving the boat so most of time I got it
slightly wrong but when I did get it right….WOW!
This leg was great, past
the crowds and a sheltered piece for about half a mile meant you
could catch your breath and really enjoy the choppy conditions.
The Dragon was flying along here and despite a few airborne
moments she flew beautifully level and landed well accelerating
as soon as the props came back in the water. In theory, the
engines will limit the revs to prevent damage so you can leave
your foot down. We were flying so high that it felt wrong to
strain the equipment, so as we flew out of the water I throttled
off for a split second. At this point you get this incredible
feeling of flying and total silence. The wind whistles past your
head. Its one of those moments in driving powerboats that I
love…power versus nature…Awesome!
I could see Martin still
ahead of me and suddenly saw him and another boat really fly
vertically up into the air out of shape and out of control. I
realised that they were where the shelter had ended and we were
back in the rough stuff. I kept my foot down but knew that any
second the same would happen to us…did I throttle off before and
lose valuable distance or did I wait and see…….
Well I waited and waited
and sure enough we took a big one, the Dragon back in flying
mode. Unfortunately as we were approaching the beamy stuff she’d
taken off at an angle so as we landed once again the force of
gravity rammed me into the side of the boat and Mike lurched
sideways into the centre. As before, the harness had helped us.
If this had been the last boat we would have been thrown out for
sure.
Whilst this part of the
course had some serious head on 3m waves, provided you kept the
revs high the boat kept her head and was relatively smooth. This
enabled us to keep up behind Ocean Dragon and some of the
Evolution boats.
We continued racing like
this for six more laps. It was exhausting racing but great fun.
You really had to read the sea and feel how the Dragon was
behaving, there was no time to lose concentration as in these
conditions just losing a second of concentration could have
serious consequences.
By now many of the
Evolution boats had been damaged, some of the Supersports boats
had retired however the majority were continuing but at a much
slower pace to ourselves and Martin. Many of the teams were now
content just to finish and collect valuable points.
On the seventh lap the
teams were starting to get tired and you could see mistakes
being made. Sadly poor Ocean Dragon was the first to succumb. He
hit a huge following wave and his boat went absolutely vertical.
Mike and I watched in amazement, I actually thought it was going
to turn over backwards. He landed very hard on the transom. He
continued for a few more metres when violently veered off the
course.
Apparently, when the
boat had gone out of shape, Martin had slipped from his position
and fallen under the dashboard but was still holding onto the
throttle! So at full throttle he was heading like a missile
skywards! When he did land it was on the engine leg which then
completely snapped off. So sadly they were out of the running.
So we continued, lonely in the lead with Flanders about a lap
behind doing an incredible job in their RIB.
Another lap later and in
the same part of the course that Martin had suffered his
accident; we came around ‘E’ mark. Slightly wide and then turn
tight left to keep on course. As I did so I just happened to
look to my left and there was the nose of Kerakoll inches from
my head! He veered to the left and me to the right and we just
avoided a collision!
We were now fortunate to
be in the lead, but would we hold together? Should we slow down
and take it easy? Or just enjoy ourselves and hope that the she
held together? It was gamble either way and in fact slowing down
would create a rougher ride.
So we carried on and we
used the time to get used to the boat. We had had a great race
in some of the biggest seas we had ever experienced.
Sadly, when we got back
we realised that whilst mechanically the boat was fine, the
chine rail on the stern had once again come off and this time
taken a large area of ‘skin’ with it doing some serious damage
to the hull. This meant we could not race on Sunday which was
very disappointing. Dragon Powerboats will be over from the
States shortly to help repair the damage so she’ll be fixed and
we’ll be raring to go for Travemunde.
NOTE:
We have been protested by one of Italian teams for a minor
technical infringement of the rules which we were unaware of.
What has been protested actually reduces horsepower to the
engines and provides us with no advantage. Due to legal reasons
we will not comment further than this.
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