Tuesday 23 January 2018

K&C's Famous Raceboats SeaFleas the first four

TIBS is over and the "World Championship Indoor SeaFlea Races" 2018 is in the history books where it surely belongs! First ever indoor powerboat races on the world's largest indoor lake. I was blown away by the quality of the support we received from the greats of teh boat racing world - it was clear that few of the K&C volunteers had the background in racing needed to quickly understand how to maneuver in such tight quarters so I made one key call to Randy Milligan who I know from raceboat events. His dad and uncle raced and knew Dave Norton very well.

Randy connected me to Norm Woods (Miss Canada & Motorsports Hall of Fame) and to Andrew Fralick (TORC). I also called Chris Taylor of Muskoka SeaFlea fame who brought experienced drivers to the show.

From these connections came Harry Wilson (Miss Canada), Sue and Steve Huff, Mark Rotharmel, Erik and Christian Luksep, Scott Robertson, Roger Duncan, Emily and Patrick Overbury, Cam Newlands, Aiden Taylor, Sarah Renton.

To all these amazing folks I send my great thanks for jumping into such an unlikely proposition and givin' 'er hell.

Here are the Famous Raceboats SeaFleas....

Mini Gas-Hopper

Mini Miss Canada (with permission from Harry Wilson)

Mini Miss Supertest
and Mini Canadiana

Now some action shots:

Emily Overbury holds off Norm

Norm's smooth flawless style set him apart

Scott really got it going too

Scott is flying


turns were really hard to maintain without cavitation



Dock crew Bruce, MB, Scott, Ron













Meanwhile back on the K&C booth in the south foyer our core team of boatshop volunteers also had a great show and lots of fun. The carving benches were a total hit again!


chips are flying

coaching by Steve, George and Anton








Toss N Save Hats very popular this year























and then it was Sunday night....

fun



Friday 12 January 2018

First test day on Lake Wow!

Good morning Folks!

Yesterday was our first time with our whole sea flea fleet on the Worlds Largest Indoor Lake at the Toronto Boat Show. Early test runs showed a surprising new complication which it is still unclear as to cause. On hard acceleration or overly aggressive turns the engines develop cavitation (prop spinning in bubbles with no traction) which drop you off plane.

As our test drivers were all very skilled with a long history of racing (except moi of course) techniques were developed to minimize this tendency. In today's tests we are going to try some different props. Here are a few of the pictures by Grant and Harry.

Steve and the Laying on of Hands

Mini Miss Canada gets wet











Eric and Wayne ready Miss Canada

MB ready for first run













The first raceboat lap ever on an indoor lake?



Roger getting ready for high speed run










Wayne explaining racing to George
Norm Woods finally gets to drive Miss Supertest






Norm gunning her

highest level of skill in action



















Eric flyby
MB just had to go again (and again)












Norm flyby

Mini Miss Candiana rigged and ready










Harry captures sea flea racing greats