3:40 PM Mon 30 Mar 2009 GMT
 | | 'Steve Curtis (left) and Bjorn Gjelsten, five World championships as a team, while Curtis, the most successful throttleman in offshore racing history, can claim another three. - The era of gentlemen racers'
Nigel Quilter
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You may have seen a story last week regarding an Australian and an Italian teaming up to contest the 2009 Powerboat P1 world titles?
It led me to thinking about the days of old when the offshore racing scene was dominated by 'gentlemen', but I mean that term in the sense that they were 'true blue' amateurs, not necessarily beautifully-dressed, well-spoken, polite, old-school style gentlemen (though some may well have been).
The era generally regarded as the beginning of what we now term the 'modern era' of offshore powerboat racing began in the mid-1950s, when a group of Americans, many of them associated with automobile racing, started 'playing around' with boats.
It's worth remembering that many boats competing in offshore races were in fact recreational boats; you go fishing one weekend, belt the tripe out of it the following weekend in an offshore race!
A far cry from the highly-professional offshore race teams of today.
We're indebted to class-1.com, the promotional arm of Class 1 Offshore Racing, for this excellent piece.
I know you'll enjoy the read.
- Bob Wonders
Man and machine against the sea
Hailed as 'the world's most rugged ocean race', the fabled Miami-Nassau races brought powerboat racing to the attention of the general public and signalled the beginnings of modern offshore racing.
These races also provided the sport with its first hero - Sam L.Griffith.
The first Miami-Nassau race, run on May 6, 1956, was the brainchild of American race car promoter Captain Sherman 'Red' Crise and yacht designer Richard 'Dick' Bertram.
Of the 11 intrepid pioneers who entered this now-famous 184-mile (296km) race, eight went the distance and completed the race.
The first boat home, after nine hours, 20 minutes, at an average speed of 19.7mph (31.7km/hr) was the Griffith-Bertram entry, 'Doodles II', a 34' (10.36-metres) wooden Chris-Craft with two 215hp Cadillac Crusader engines.
Griffith was a larger than life character who made the sport his own in those early years.
He was regarded as 'the man' and before his untimely death in 1963 he would win four Miami-Nassau races, break Gar Wood's 41-year-old Miami-New York powerboat record and capture the Around Long Island Marathon.
Many have since sought to emulate his skills and when Class 1 came of age with a sanctioned World Drivers' Championship it was his name that was selected to adorn the trophy that is today the sport's biggest prize.
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 race on August 19, 1961, with victory in the inaugural 179-mile (288km) race going to Tommy Sopwith in 'Thunderbolt'.
A year later the Italians added their challenge with the staging of the 189-mile (304km) Viareggio-Bastia-Viareggio, which was won by a former Italian navy submarine commander, Attilio Petroni.
Over the next 30-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 (UIM) and the inception of the Sam Griffith Trophy in 1964, the Americans were at the forefront of the sport's technological development.
 | The legendary Don Aronow, one of the pioneers of modern offshore racing, pictured at the Cigarette Racing Team headquarters on North East 188th Street, North Miami Beach, the same street on which he would be murdered by a rival in 1987. - era of gentlemen racers - Cigarette Racing Team Click Here to view large photo |
Men who have since become legends, Jim Wynne, Dick Bertram and Don Aronow led the way with Daytona, MerCruiser and Aeromarine powerplants reigning supreme.
During this 20-year period, the Americans posted 13 championships and the Italians just 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 shores of the Mediterranean at Viareggio, the spiritual home of Italian offshore racing that a Class 1 World Champion won the title in equipment not of American origin, nor assembled and tended by American engineers.
In the 1980s the pendulum swung to witness a period of European design dominance.
Don Shead's aluminium monohulls, Italian manufacturers Picchiotti and CUV and the James Beard-Clive Curtis Cougar catamarans set the pace.
 | The undeniable skill and experience of the Italian legend Fabio Buzzi - Round Britain powerboat race - RYA Round Britain |
The European resurgence was completed by the genius of Fabio Buzzi, whose quantum leap into GRP (glass reinforced polymer) hulls, turbo-charged Aifo Iveco and Seatek diesel engines and integral surface drive transmissions proved unbeatable.
In the 1990s, we witnessed the emergence of the Michael Peters-designed Tencara and Victory hulls that dominated the honours list with the American Sterling, the Italian Lamborghini and the Seatek diesel engines sharing the power battle.
The last 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 his 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 United Arab Emirates.
Thirty-two of the championships have been won by Americans, 19 by Italians, 11 by competitors from the United Arab Emirates, eight by a Briton, six by Norwegians, two by competitors from Monaco and Puerto Rico and one ach by representatives from Brazil, Finland and Saudi Arabia.
Five champions have taken their title as 'novices' competing in their first season in Class 1 racing; only three driver/throttleman partnerships have managed back-to-back titles, Bonomi-Powers in 1973-74, S Al Tayer-Serralles in 1995-96 and Gjelsten-Curtis in 2002-03.
Gjelsten and Curtis comprise the only partnership to win the title five times and Steve Curtis the only man to clinch the title eight times.
The world title was not held in 1990 as a mark of respect for Stefano Casiraghi who died defending his title in Monaco.
Twenty-three titles have been won in monohulls and 20 in catamarans.
Of these winning boats, 31 have been built in GRP, eight in aluminium and four in wood.
Petrol engines have powered 36 winners and diesel 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 20 championships with the more recently introduced surface drives making up the remainder.
Propeller design has seen the early three-bladed bronze wheels superseded by stainless steel propellers of up to six blades for maximum efficiency and a top team might carry 12 pairs of propellers of differing pitches and diameters to accommodate differing sea conditions, fuel loads and handling characteristics.
Speeds have altered beyond all recognition.
In the early 1960s, races were regularly won at averages below 30mph (48km/hr), but it was the advent of catamarans in the 1980s that allowed the 'magic barrier' of 100mph (160km/hr) to be regularly exceeded and now, winning averages of 125mph (200km/hr) 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 of yesteryear stood up to the elements as they struggled with navigation, throttles and the wheel, taking a battering 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 enter the water for testing or racing and are prepared and maintained by a crew of professional engineers.
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 40-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.
by Bob Wonders
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Rottnest Island, WA
