History of Class 1 Racing - part 2

Thunderbolt 1961

During the 1950s the Americans had the sport to themselves laying claim to the three major offshore races in existence, the Miami-Nassau, the Around Long Island Marathon and the Miami-Key West. But in the early 60s Europe entered the fray to challenge the Americans. Publisher Sir Max Aitken, inspired by the Miami-Nassau, established the Cowes-Torquay on August 19, 1961, with victory in the inaugural 179-mile race going to Tommy Sopwith in Thunderbolt. A year later the Italians added their challenge with the staging of the 198-mile Viareggio-Bastia-Viareggio, which was won by an Italian ex-navy submarine commander, Attilio Petroni, in A’ Speranziella. Over the next thirty years an enduring struggle ensued between the three founding nations for racing supremacy. In the 20 years following its recognition by the Union Internationale Motonautique (U.I.M.) and the inception of the Sam Griffith Trophy in 1964 the Americans were at the forefront of the sport’s technological development.

American Design predominates until the 70s
Jim Wynne, Dick Bertram and Don Aronow led the way with the Daytona, Mercuiser and Aeromarine powerplants reigning supreme. During this period the Americans posted thirteen champions and the Italians six. The lone exception was Wally Franz, a Brazilian who lifted the title in 1975, but he succeeded with an American boat, engine, transmission and throttleman – hardly a Brazilian affair! Indeed, it was not until Italy’s Francesco Cosentino took the 1978 title in a boat designed by Don Shead and built on the Mediterranean at Viareggio, the spiritual home of Italian offshore powerboat racing, that a Class 1 World Champion won the title in equipment not of American origin, nor assembled and tended by American engineers.

The 1980s and 1990s
In the 1980s the pendulum swung to witness a period of European design dominance. Don Shead’s Aluminium monohulls from Enfield, Italian manufacturers Picchiotti and CUV and the James Beard-Clive Curtis Cougar catamarans set the pace. The European resurgence was completed by the genius of Fabio Buzzi, whose quantum leap into Glass Reinforced Polymer (GRP) hulls, turbo-charged Aifo Iveco and Seatek diesel engines, and integral surface drive transmissions through his FB Corse concern proved unbeatable. The decade of the 90s witnessed the emergence of the Michael Peters designed, Tencara and Victory built hulls that dominated the honours lists with the American Sterling, the Italian Lamborghini petrol and the Seatek diesel engines sharing the power battle.

International affair
The last year 30-years have not only witnessed an evolution in the technical side of the sport, but a major overhaul to the overall make-up of the championship, becoming a far more international affair. In the early years, it was commonplace for teams to field two boat entries, competing in as many as 18 races at venues across America, Australia, South Africa, Sweden, France, Italy and the UK. Although the financial austerity in the 80s seriously hit the championship leading to one event hosting three races in a single location, the number of competing nations nevertheless continued to increase to include Argentina, Brazil, Finland, Japan, Jordan, Kuwait, Malaysia, Monaco, New Zealand and Norway. In 1992 the Championship reverted to a multi event competition and more importantly in the following years the diversity of nationalities claiming the World Drivers’ Championship swelled in numbers including America, Great Britain, Italy, Monaco, Norway, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

7 times World Champion
Fourteen titles have been won by Americans, twelve by Italians, six by competitors from the UAE, seven by a Briton, five by Norwegians and one each by representatives from Brazil, Monaco and Saudi Arabia. Five champions have taken their titles as novices in their first season in Class I racing and only three driver/throttleman partnerships have managed back to back titles, Bonomi/Powers in 1973/4, S Al Tayer/Serralles in 1995/6 and Gjelsten/Curtis in 2002/3. Gjelsten and Curtis are the only partnership to win the title four times and Steve Curtis the only man to clinch the world title seven times. The world title was not awarded in 1990, as a mark of respect for Stefano Casiraghi who died whilst defending his title in Monaco.

The winning boats
Twenty-three titles have been won in monohulls and eighteen in catamarans. Of these winning boats, 29 have been built in GRP, eight in aluminium and four in wood. Petrol engines have powered 34 winners and diesels the remaining seven. Three early titles went to boats using conventional propeller shafts but the more efficient, fully trimable Mercruiser stern drives have accounted for twenty titles while the more recently introduced surface drives make up the remainder. Propeller design has seen the early three-bladed bronze wheels superseded by stainless steel props of up to six blades for maximum efficiency and a top team might carry twelve pairs of props of differing pitches and diameters to accommodate differing sea conditions, fuel loads and handling characteristics.

It's all about speed
Speeds have altered beyond all recognition. In the early 1960’s, races were regularly won at averages of below 30mph (48km/h) but it was the advent of catamarans in the 1980’s that allowed the magic barrier of 100mph (160km/h) to be regularly exceeded and now, winning averages of 125mph (200km/h) or more are not unusual. This quest for speed has produced boats, engines and transmission systems which are inevitably more sophisticated and the use of Fibre Reinforced Polymer (FRP) with advanced composites using Kevlar and carbon fibre has happily made them safer.

The Crews
The crews of yester year stood up to the elements as they struggled with navigation, throttles and the wheel, taking a battering from the elements with little protection. Today’s drivers and throttlemen enjoy the advantages of being strapped securely into body-hugging seats within safety cells beneath lexan canopies borrowed from the aerospace industry, whilst monitoring their progress on equally advanced global positioning systems (GPS). Yesterday’s racers were amateur sportsmen and women, pioneers who looked the part. Today’s crews wear fireproof overalls, driving boots, have helmets plumbed with intercommunicating radios and do battle in boats that only go afloat to test or race and are prepared and maintained by a crew of professional engineers.

The ethos stays the same
These and all the other factors have shaped Class 1 powerboat racing into what it is today. But one aspect hasn’t changed in the past forty-odd years of action - the sea. And for all the progress made, and the highly professional sport that it has become, Class 1 still shares the same ingenuity and ethos of its founders – man and machine against the sea.

Source: class-1.com