Bermuda Challenge Champions Gearing Up

[Serious News]

Garvin, Fertig eye more records.

By Eric Colby posted Jul 23rd, 2014 at 9:59am

Following up their record-setting performance in the 2013 Bermuda Challenge run aboard a Skater 42 V-bottom, Tyson Garvin and Chris Fertig have bigger plans — much bigger. They are planning to build a catamaran more than twice as long to attempt a future circumnavigation; but first, to test some technologies and safety equipment, they’re having Douglas Marine build them a Skater 50 catamaran.

The one-off model will be based on a Skater 46 catamaran, but will have a transom bustle and will be a foot taller to better handle rough offshore conditions for some of the records they plan to attempt. It will also have suspension seats with 1 foot of travel to keep their vision lines the same as aboard the older boat. Deck hatches will be installed farther aft to keep them from breaking if the boat stuffs, and the sponson bows will be taller so that if the boat stuffs it will resurface more quickly. In the event of a stuff, the cockpit will have 4-inch-diameter drains like a sportfishing boat. If they do strike a submerged object and the hull is compromised, the catamaran will be equipped with inflatable bladders the team can use to float the boat to get to safety. For a little wow factor, when the boat pulls up to a dock, Garvin will hit a button and fenders will pop out and inflate.

You never know what you’re going to run into when you’re way out there,” said Garvin, who is the throttleman and crew chief of the team. “We told Skater we wanted it to be taller to handle bigger waves.” Garvin estimated that Douglas Marine is using an extra 1,000 pounds of fiberglass and Kevlar, and it will have extra bracing.

The catamaran’s tunnel will also be wider, and the inner walls of the tunnel will be steeper to pack more air, but not in the name of speed. Garvin explained that they want the boat to be able to carry the extra weight of the fuel and safety gear that will be on board. The boat will have a 1,400-gallon fuel capacity, and the team wants to run 100 mph and get 2 mpg when full of fuel. There are tanks in the front of the boat with which they can empty or add fuel when they want to change the boat’s riding angle. They will not put trim tabs on the 50-footer or the bigger boat.

“At 120 or 130 mph, we’re never going to blow over backward,” said Garvin. “We want to pack as much air as we can.”

Also in the name of safety, a custom windshield for the boat is being fabricated at Lee Aerospace in Wichita, Kansas, which makes aircraft windshields and windows. The owner of the company, Jim Lee, is a former offshore racer who currently owns the Skater 46 Freedom USA, which runs in many poker runs, so Lee knows what it takes to construct a safe windshield. Garvin said that the mold for the windshield alone cost $60,000.

Among the high-tech onboard equipment the team will be testing is a video system that will allow them to stream over satellite feeds anywhere in the world. Fertig is handling the video equipment. As of early July, the team hasn’t decided on power for the boat, but it will have Arneson ASD 8 surface drives, and Garvin’s company, Apex Manufacturing, is fabricating the propellers from solid blocks of stainless steel. Flo-Scan fuel-flow meters will be used to ensure maximum efficiency. Simrad equipment will be used for navigation, including radar and AIS.

The final piece of equipment might be the most important for the team’s sanity. The boat will have a JL audio system. “When you’re going for 20 hours straight it just gets boring,” said Garvin. “We might run this thing for a month straight.”

Garvin plans to have the boat by fall. He said that the safest record to attempt on their first outing would be New Orleans to St. Louis because they would never be far from shore. The team plans to do other runs to test ideas and equipment, and if things go well and they can secure a sponsor, they’ll start building the Skater 86.

“The only reason we’re doing this boat is to do long-distance runs, so everything designed around it is to be able to do long-distance runs,” said Garvin. “There’s nothing out there that goes very fast at all that can also go a long distance.”

Entire Story and Pics http://www.boatingmag.com/boats/berm...14&spPodID=030

[Ratickle]

An 86' Skater????????

[Serious News]

From 2013


http://www.boatingmag.com/bermuda-challenge-2013

Boat Specifications
Manufacturer – Skater Powerboats
Model – 399 V-hull
Material – Carbon/Kevlar
Engines – Twin 5.9L, 480hp Cummins
Transmissions – ZF Two speeds
Drives – Arneson #8s
Props – Precision Works 19 x 44
Electronics - Simrad NSS Integrated Navigation system with satellite weather
Performance
Fast cruise - 78mph @ 2mpg (light load)
Top speed - 84mph (light load)

In 2012, Chris Fertig and Tyson Garvin became Bermuda Challenge champions. They held the record for less than a month, being bested by a team led by Fabio Buzzi.
Read all about it here.
Today, Fertig and Garvin are watching the weather and hope to make a new record attempt in a new boat, a Skater 399 powered by twin Cummins diesels and Arneson Surface Drives.
According to Fertig, who I spoke to on the phone from Virginia Beach, Virginia, the boat is very efficient, netting 2 MPG at its “fast cruise” of 78 mph.
We’ll host live streaming video coverage of the event, as well as text and social media updates from Fertig and Tyson enroute.
Like them, and like mariners since time immemorial, we are just waiting on the weather.
In the meantime, check out the specs, and photos, of the Skater they are using for this Bermuda Challenge attempt, above.

[Ratickle]

I have to remember to ask Pete about the 86'

[Serious News]

[Serious News]

[Serious News]

What is the Bermuda Challenge?

About the Bermuda Challenge

It started out almost as a dare after two friends got to talking in 1994, or so the story goes…..

David Seidman, then the editor of Boating magazine, thought that the time was right to start showcasing the improvements that smaller boats had been making in the late nineties. They were faster, stronger, lighter, and now even mere mortals could afford them.

What better way to show off these improvements than to try to cross the Gulf Stream, say from New York to Bermuda?

It would be 760 miles of Atlantic Ocean versus Man – and man would be armed with a boat, outboard engines and a lot of nerve…..
Larry Graf did it in 1996 on a GlacierBay in 37 hours, leaving from Virginia however. In 1999 the record went down to slightly over 29 hours, this time on a catamaran leaving from New York.

In 2002, a veterinarian named Neil Burnie and Bill Ratlieff, the manufacturer of Renaissance Prowlers, set the record that has stood for more than a decade, despite many well-sponsored challengers who’ve tried to beat it: 22 hours, 23 minutes.

The 30’ Prowler, light but built like a tank, cut the world record by 25% and did it using far less fuel than its predecessors.

[Serious News]

At 12:30 a.m. ADT August 22, 2013, 15 hours after powering past the Statue of Liberty, Chris Fertig and Tyson Garvin roared into Bermuda’s Town Cut Channel aboard their Cummins diesel powered Skater 399 and set a new Bermuda Challenge record… for the second time in just about a year. Their official time of 15 hours and 48 minutes beat the old record of 17 hours and 6 minutes set by Fabio Buzzi’s team last September.
These guys have chuztpa. Here’s the dish, the scoop, a brief scorecard.

•It’s 720 miles from New York Harbor to Bermuda’s Town Cut Channel.
•The Bermuda Challenge was founded in 1996 by Boating’s very own Editor-At-Large, David Seidman.
•Two years ago, Americans Fertig and Garvin made an attempt at the Bermuda Challenge, but were thwarted by a freak storm that caused them to abort the record run and head for shore. They vowed to try again.
•Last August, Fertig and Garvin ran a Statement Marine 37 to a Bermuda Challenge record of 21 hours and 39 minutes.
•Several weeks later, go-fast luminary, Fabio Buzzi, flew in a boat and crew from Italy. That 39-foot FB Design (Buzzi’s company) propelled by diesel surface drives, carried Buzzi’s crew to a new record of 17 hours and 6 minutes. Both Fertig/Garvin and the FB Design camps expressed public respect for each other, but remained silent about any future Challenge record attempts.
•Over the winter of 2012/2013, Fertig and Tyson confided to Boating that they were seeking sponsorship, raising funds and planning a new campaign with a new boat. Men of middle-class means, sponsorship offered their only avenue for such a venture.
•Tyson and Fertig are now two-time holders of the Bermuda Challenge Record, the only team to garner that honor.
Please join Boating in congratulating Fertig and Garvin by using the comments box below.

[endeavor1]

Brass cohones and deep pockets. Look forward to more of their records. Funhome "team Kansas" and I discussed running his saber or my former SBC twin Baja up the Missouri River to attempt the record. Logistics and time away from work quickly squashed that. Dare to dream I guess !!!

[Ratickle]

What record on the Missouri?