Unlimited hydroplanes - the other "other" racing

That may be at San Diego, which has an island in the middle of the course. Speaking of which, the APBA Gold Cup, the biggest event of the year, will be there in September. It's also the last race of the season, so it may have the National Championship on the line.

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If anyone wants to HEAR the way Unlimiteds sounded when they had Merlin V-12 engines and really were "thunderboats", watch and listen to the first 5 minutes of this video, shot yesterday on Lake Washington in Seattle. The boat is the restored Pay 'N Pak, which was the 1973-76 National Champion and the first boat to have a rear wing.

 

That was the same boat seen in the clip in post #28 above! In 1978, with the Pay 'N Pak boat now obsolete, it was sold to the city of Madison, who switched the engine to a turbocharged Allison (which they had plenty of) and raced if for another decade. It won one race, I believe in 1983, when it outlasted its faster competition. After sitting in storage for years, the Hydroplane Museum in Seattle acquired the boat and restored it to its mid-70s configuration, as seen in the videoclip above.

Here's what it looked like in the '80s:

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It's been announced that the season-opening Guntersville Lake Hydrofest will be held earlier than in past years, on June 6-8. 2025. And there should be a bigger field in 2025, with several boats that have been shelved for years being prepared for action.

 

An unexpected development. Since their equipment is top-notch, it should be bought by a well-funded organization. I suspect the Madison regatta will continue as before.

 

Finally, here is the current 2025 schedule. It had been expected that Detroit would be back for 2025, so maybe (hopefully!) they are still working out the details on that. I'm glad that Guntersville is a bit earlier since if can get very hot later in the month. Just a reminder that Madison is in Indiana and the Tri-Cities are in central Washington state.

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