2010 Seafair came early to some...

The 2010 Seafair race came early this year to many as ERCU kicked off their 3rd race of the season with their Seafair Trophy Race. ERCU is a scale rc hydroplane group located in the Pacific Northwest that holds races for 1/10th and 1/7th scale electric hydroplanes. The pits held 25-30 people which raced in the 4 different classes (both the 1/10th scales and 1/7th scales are split into a vintage shovel nose class and a modern pickle fork class). For more information on ERCU visit their website, http://www.e-rcu.org/. The weather held out to be one of the nicest days of the year so far as it was clear skys in the mid 70s with a slight breeze to from the west coming off the coast, perfect racing conditions.

Today I raced my late father's checkerboard Miss Bardahl along with Kerry Kjos' 1960 Miss Thriftway. I was fortunate enough to make the first connie with my Miss Bardahl and the final heat with Kerry's Thriftway. I made a great start in the connie with the Bardahl and lead wire to wire. As I already had a ride in the final heat with Kerry's Thriftway, I opted to drive the boat that was eligible to start on the front line and bench the Bardahl. (Sorry Mr. Manchester!)

The final heat for the vintage class turned out to be a fast and strange one. Coming around the left corner before the start a few boats tangled into each other leaving boat parts from lane 2 to lane 6, taking out 3 boats before the race had even began. Going down for the start Jeff Campbell with his outrigger Pay'n'Pak and I took off battling deck to deck and swapping leads for a good two and a half laps before Jeff got a little lead coming off the right turn and never looked back. My boat did not have such a good corner, took a little dive inside the course mistakenly missing a buoy which resulted in a lap penalty and 4th place overall.

I was able to take video of the final heats for both 1/7th scale classes and the modern 1/10th scale class. I will post them shortly and congratulations to Jeff Campbell, Bill Smiley, Gale Whitestein, and Craig Mullen for their wins today!

On a side note it is always good to see fellow boaters that have strayed away come back into the hobby. That being said welcome back Brad!