Cookee

First of all I'm from the other side of the pond - Here in England things are very different from the popular boating area in the US - our weather and general conditions are more "difficult" with colder temperatures and generally rougher water. Most of my experience is in power boating although I started off racing dinghies when I was a youngster, this is where I got my basic knowledge of boating from, I also have a commercial skippers licence (power) which is where I got my boat handling skills from. After giving up sailing I got into racing karts and held an International licence mostly racing the air cooled 125cc karts which were capable of around 120mph. After moving down to Devon in the early 90's I got involved with OCR racing which were mostly Phantom 18's (18' single outboard) with Mercury XR2 200hp engines, they ran at least mid 70's with over 20 boats competing in those days. After that I went on to build and race our own "BananaShark" brand of boats having some success in Class III 2 litre at home and at World Championship level although a Championship was always just out of reach - we won the 2005 Formula one RIB championships and managed to break a couple of speed records on Coniston water 40 after Campbell lost his life on the same spot.

What's happening in the UK? For some years now there has been a decline in numbers in Offshore in the UK, I think that the RYA (Royal Yachting Association) could have done much more, we have too many classes and the number and complexity of the regulations can be mind boggling for someone trying to enter the sport let alone experienced racers.

It was nice to see the British racing in Key West, Nigel Hook lives in the US and has done for a long time so I don't really think of him as British but when he wins it's nice to think he used to live over here!

Nigel in Lucas Oil Key West

Vee Gangavian might not sound English but he he's got a passport and he's as English as they come - he even drinks lots of tea so he's definitely one of ours!


Vee in Microlink Key West
My first moan is that the race distances were very short indeed not too mention the size of the course! I wasn't there (my only visit was 2005 and I enjoyed it immensely) but over here we have no option but to race in very challenging conditions - if we didn't we would never race! I know that some US racers believe longer and tougher is the way to go as well - after all it's meant to be Offshore! When I see videos from "The Old Days" in US waters I see some rough water racing - what happened?