Powerboat racers claim 2nd in East London
A collision with another boat caused them to flip and dashed their hopes of a win.
Ballito’s team Atlas Copco traveled down to East London to take on some of SA’s best racers on the open water last weekend. They struggled a little in the heats, but managed to win back some pride by taking second in the long-haul race.
After a long drive from Ballito through the Transkei the team arrived in Gonubie near East London for the national surf and long-haul races. A last minute injury sidelined their regular co-pilot and they were lucky to find Cameron Mackenzie, a local lad with tons of enthusiasm and previous racing experience to fill in with Reghard Roets.
“As we arrived late on Friday night we had to use the early heats to fine tune the setup as it was our first visit to East London waters and with a different sized co-pilot as well,” said Roets.
“We arrived just after daybreak on the picturesque Gonubie beach where the boats were launched in the river from where we maneuvered them through the mouth and onto a pristine white beach.”
In the first two heats the pair finished in 4th and 5th places and after some setup changes got into the lead for the third race. Unfortunately this was short lived after a collision with another boat caused them to flip and end the race prematurely.
“A bad start in the final spoiled all hopes of a good result and we finished in 5th after just edging ahead of the S38 Accel boat on the last lap.”
Despite a less than desirable result in the surf races the team were confident for the following Sunday’s long haul as Roets says the endurance events are definitely their forte at the moment. The long-haul was run from Orient beach and consisted of nine laps of 10km each.
“We were hoping for a longer distance but with three compulsory beach stops thrown in it was bound to be a crowd pleaser!
“The tactics of getting our three pit stops out of the way early on and settling into a rhythm worked like a charm and by lap six we were lying second behind the Boost racing entry by about 30 seconds.
“Our Yamaha performed flawlessly and we slowly hauled the leader in finishing three seconds behind in the sprint for the line. One more lap and we would have taken the heavier silverware home! This was still a great result and a great debut for Cameron in our team in true last minute fashion.”
Winning the prize as the best presented team was an added bonus and left them all in very high spirits despite having to pack and leave the festive atmosphere and head north for the nine hour drive home.
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