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Monday, November 25, 2013Decrease text sizeIncrease text sizeAdd to FacebookAdd to Twitter
Super Boat International races: Will they stay or will they go?
BY TIMOTHY O'HARA Citizen Staff
tohara@keysnews.com
The city of Sarasota has withdrawn its request to take over the annual powerboat world championships that have been staged in Key West for 33 years, but on Sunday it still remained uncertain if the races will stay here.

Key West World Championship organizers are still in negotiations with the city of Clearwater and expect to make a final decision on the location by Dec. 31, said race organizer John Carbonell, who runs Super Boat International.

"We need to make a decision soon," Carbonell told The Citizen on Friday.

Carbonell did not offer details to why Sarasota gave up its bid for the races, which has pumped in millions of dollars a year into Key West.

The Monroe County Tourist Development Council has appropriated $100,000 for the races to be held in Key West in November 2014, which is $20,000 less than in previous years. However, Carbonell told The Citizen he would be willing to walk away from the money if Clearwater offers him a better deal.

The Key West City Commission has directed its staff to work out a five-year deal to keep the races in Key West. However, Carbonell has already said he does not want to be locked into a deal until he knows what both cities have to offer. Clearwater currently hosts a smaller race.

Declining revenues, fewer sponsorships and the Tourist Development Council funding have been cited by Carbonell as reasons for the races moving out of Key West.

Carbonell also said he has had to haggle with many hoteliers to get free rooms for boat race event staff, and some businesses that benefit from the influx of visitors are not willing to pitch in to make the races happen.

The city is considering reconfiguring the layout of the Truman Waterfront, and that could impact the races as the dry pits for the races are housed there. Carbonell's event does make money selling passes to race fans who want access to the pits.

tohara@keysnews.com

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From the Keynoter.

Boat poker run poised to expand in the Keys
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By SUSAN COCKING
Miami Herald
Posted - Saturday, November 30, 2013 11:00 AM EST
pokerrun
Key West Poker Run participants party at Boca Grande at the conclusion of their event in early November.
Insurance executive Scott Safranek of Omaha, Neb., has been an avid go-fast boater for years on Midwestern lakes and rivers. But Safranek felt intimidated at the prospect of driving his 29-foot Baja with twin 700-horsepower engines in the open ocean.


That's why he joined the 200-plus-member Florida Powerboat Club last month -- just so he'd have plenty of experienced company boating nearly 170 miles from Miami to Key West.

About 150 boats, from 28-foot outboards to 160-foot megayachts, were signed up for the club's annual Key West Poker Run -- what organizers say is the largest event of its kind in the world -- sandwiched between the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show and the Key West World Championship powerboat races the first week of November.

Accompanied by his wife and another couple, Safranek skippered one of the smallest boats in the fleet and said he averaged between 70 and 90 mph for the trip. They stopped at two checkpoints en route to Key West to pick up playing cards; in a poker run, whoever draws the best hand wins a prize at the end.

After the group arrived safely in the Southernmost City, Safranek found out he took the grand prize -- a 2013 Mustang convertible.

He was hooked.

"What I got out of this whole deal, besides the car, it was a bucket list thing to do," Safranek said. "But now I want to do more of these things. It turned out to be a first-class experience I'll probably never forget."

For more than 20 years, the Florida Powerboat Club, headquartered in Pompano Beach and led by founder/president Stu Jones, has been leading large groups of boaters on outings around Florida and to the Bahamas. The club reserves hotel rooms and dock space, sets up transportation for boat owners' vehicles, and organizes parties and day trips.

While many of the boats are large expensive speedsters capable of more than 100 mph, the events are not races; they are simply excuses to go fast from one place to another, then socialize with other boaters at the destination.

"We show them the sizzle, how much fun it can be," Jones said. "I make safety a top priority." Key Wester John Carbonell, president of Super Boat International, has promoted the Key West World Championship powerboat races for 33 years.

But Carbonell is in talks with the city of Clearwater, host of the Super Boat National Championships, about moving the event. That comes as the Monroe County Tourist Development Council has decreased public money spent on marketing the event from $120,000 to $100,000 next year.

Jones said he's poised to expand the scope of his annual Key West Poker Run. It has corresponded with race week for 21 years.

"I think what this really amounts to," Jones said, "is participation in offshore powerboat racing has just evaporated over the years and the numbers just aren't there. It's dying a slow death."

Owing to rules imposed by the American Poker Runs Association and enforced by Jones, no one has been killed or seriously injured in a Florida Powerboat Club event. Mandatory safety meetings are held ahead of time. Participants must follow a pace boat and wear life jackets, and the skipper must wear a kill switch attached to the ignition key so that if he or she falls overboard, the engines will cut off. Drinking while driving is prohibited.

At the Key West event, the club set up a Poker Run village at the Conch Republic Seafood Co. and adjacent to the A & B Lobsterhouse dock.

Performance boat builders such as Nor-Tech exhibited new models; beautiful women posed for photos and video wearing skimpy bathing suits. There were cocktail parties, a beach outing to uninhabited Boca Grande Key, and the awards party. Participating boats, which hailed from all over the U.S. and as far away as Europe, outnumbered offshore race competitors by more than three to one.

With that success, Jones has volunteered to fill the potential World Championship vacancy with a comparable spectator event. He proposed to several city commissioners to add a short-course, "shootout" format similar to auto drag racing to next year's Poker Run. City commissioners appeared receptive during an informal meeting at the Poker Run village.

Poker runs are also good for the recreational boating business.

Nor-Tech, headquartered in North Fort Myers, displayed four new models at the village immediately after the Fort Lauderdale Boat Show. Marketing director Terry Sobo said they closed a sale in Key West for a $450,000 39-foot center-console after talking with the buyer at the show.

"Boat shows, poker runs, word-of-mouth all culminate together," Sobo said. "It's been a great opportunity for us over all these years."

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