Edmonds hydro third in first heat in Madison

Miss Peters and May on the Ohio River.  (Photo by James Crisps)
Miss Peters and May on the Ohio River.
(Photo by James Crisps)

Edmonds-based unlimited hydroplane Miss Peters and May got third place in its heat Saturday during the first race of the 2016 H1 Unlimited Hydroplane season. The race is being held in Madison, Ind., which has hosted hydroplane racing for over 60 years.

Driver Tom Thompson was in second place when he tried to move to the inside lane while in pursuit of J. Michael Kelly in the Graham Trucking hydro. While making the move, Thompson got caught in Kelly’s wake and our local boat hooked and lost speed. Thompson recovered but not before Brian Perkins was able to pass with the Payne West Insurance boat. Rookie driver Andrew Tate, son of former driver Mark Tate, followed up in fourth placed with the Les Schwab Red Dot.

In Saturday’s other heat, defending champion Jimmy Shane drove the Home Street Bank hydro to a wire-to-wire win. He was followed Cal Phipps in the Dalton Industries and Kevin Eacrett in the Miss Car Star. Failing to start was Jeff Bernard in the Graham Trucking II.

The Home Street Bank boat ran last year as the Oh Boy! Oberto and is owned by the citizens of Madison, Ind. So it was a great result for the home town crowd.

Racing continues Sunday with two more sets of preliminary heats followed by a winner-take-all final. This is the first race of the five-race season series, which comes to Seattle the first week of August.

Before leaving for Madison last weekend, Miss Peters and May owner Scott Raney told My Edmonds News that since the boat was not damaged during the 2015 season, the team was able to concentrate on efforts to improve performance for this year. Specifically, they spent extensive time on beefing up their race engines, made five new propellers and fine- tuned the hull to allow it to ride over the water with more speed. The work showed in Saturday’s racing as the boat qualified fourth fastest overall with an average speed of over 138 MPH.

Our other local hydroplane, owned by Edmonds resident Kelly Stocklin, did not go to the race in Madison as it is still being reconstructed after last year’s accident in San Diego. The boat was essentially destroyed and Stocklin has spent the last nine months rebuilding it. The team was able to go to a test session in June in the Tri-Cities. The boat looked faster than it had in the past but just needed some more time to get the systems perfected. Stocklin had decided that at age 64 he should turn the driving range over to someone new. Dustin Echols was driving at the test session. The boat expects to join the fleet at the race in Tri-Cities at the end of this month.

Follow all the hydroplane action here on My Edmonds News.

— By Harry Gatjens

 

  1. Thanks for your boat racing coverage again this year. Very cool to have two H1 hydroplanes based in Edmonds.

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