I grew up in the Northwest going to boat races starting before I can remember. My dad was crew chief for a tunnel boat team that raced SST120, SST140 and even toured with the F1 PROP tour a season or two. We always had some kind of race boat stored at our house. There are pictures of me “fishing” off the little dock at the boat launch at Pateros when I was two or three, boats all around me. After a few years away from racing during high school I jumped back in when a college buddy of mine and I decided late on a Saturday night in 2009 to head to Moses Lake to watch the races on Sunday. Completely unknown to me, my dad and his childhood friends (who had bought and restored the E-74 Annabelle S. vintage hydro) were already there. I immediately got involved with crew duties and was hooked. After a couple years I began driving the Annabelle S. and was awarded the 2011 West Coast Vintage Rookie of the Year. During the 2013 season I decided I wanted to have my own boat and run in the 2.5L Stock class. When one of the Wamsley family Triple I boats popped up for sale I jumped on it and purchased the boat in December 2013. They were always my favorites in the mid to late 90’s because of the unmistakable paint scheme that it still has today. We ran the second half of the 2014 season and struggled. In 2015 we started getting things dialed in and made every race in Region 10, earning us 6th in the nation (and 3rd in outright points earned). We’ve been through a lot in our first couple seasons, two blown engines, a fire, a little sinking, and tons of fun, friendships made, and lessons learned. This year we are trying something new. After the last engine failure I decided to opt out of the conventional (and legal) engine package in favor of an experimental setup. The boat now has a 2.0L 4 cylinder “Duratec” out of a 2005 Ford Focus. It is all aluminum (roughly 75 lbs lighter than the old engine), fuel injected, and computer controlled. It is slated to be the new legal engine for the class if it can be proven to be affordable, available, competitive, and manageable in terms of referee inspection, and tuning limitations. It is, after all, a stock class. I will be using this page to keep everyone updated and informed about the project and general status of the team.
