The conversation started months ago, but spiraled quickly under its own gravity into a far larger sphere when I posed the question, “If it was up to you, what would you do differently?” It doesn’t take a whole heck of a lot of looking to learn that we at The Watercraft Journal are particularly fond of offshore racing. The challenges of offshore racing are unlike those found elsewhere – apart from an ironclad commitment to pushing through pain and exhaustion to persevere.

In talking with PWCOffshore.com‘s fearless leader, owner and organizer Mark Gerner, we learned how deep his desire to dramatically grow the world of American offshore racing was. “People think I’m an event promoter. That’s 100-percent not the case,” Mark admitted. “I help rally everyone to go, but I’m not putting on the races.”

But that’s not entirely true. Anybody who knows Mark or the PWCOffshore.com crew know that they do much, much more than just “get the word out.” And it’s because of this steely drive to help grow offshore racing that PWCOffshore recently announced their “Offshore Racing Promotions Guidelines for Promoters.”

According to PWCOffshore.com’s Facebook wall, “PWC Endurance and Offshore PWC Racing needs more promoters and more races throughout the world, especially here in the United States. Have you ever thought about becoming an offshore PWC and/or PWC Endurance Race Promoter – here’s a checklist and set of guidelines we put together that might assist you in doing a race. Great Lakes, Northwest, Northeast, Texas area, Louisiana? Why not? Let’s go racing.”

We at The Watercraft Journal are honored to have played a small role in this document’s development and looking forward to seeing these guidelines put to good use soon!

The numbers don’t lie. It’s a maxim we at The Watercraft Journal have been using and its sure to be repeated with the results of this weekend’s Greenhulk Hydrodrags. Following the annual MudBug gathering of Greenhulk.net forum members in Morgan City, Louisiana, the second round of the Hydrodrags came to the quiet port town to chew up the still southern waters.

While there was no shortage of trash talk and money being exchanged between drag racers, the big talk was who was going to beat the standing record of 106mph in the Speed Alley. The record has stood for a good while now and quite frankly, folks were getting antsy for a new champion.

Aboard a CRT-built “GPRXP”, Miami, Florida’s Maikel Gonzalez not only broke the record, but outright shattered it with two back-to-back world-dominating passes. Titled “Blue Zone,” Maikel’s GPRXP was anticipated to surpass the standing record, but not like this…

In his first pass in the RIVA Racing Speed Alley Hydro Unlimited class, Maikel tipped the GPS’ and radar gun at 108 miles per hour! If leaping past the standing record was a fluke, Maikel made his second – and most amazing – attempt, firing off an astounding 112 miles per hour.

The Watercraft Journal talked with Maikel who beamed, “I can’t explain how happy I feel right now; it’s a dream come true! The pass I did was from 35mph to 112mph in 3.4 seconds…insane!”

Although unwilling to share all of his secrets, Maikel did provide a small breakdown of what propels “Blue Zone”: “The ski is powered by a CRT-built, turbocharged Sea-Doo 4-tec engine making in excess of 700hp but still driveable as a recreational ski. Power is delivered by a Precision Turbocharger and intercooler, but kept under control at all times by AEM performance electronics. Fuel delivery is accomplished through a custom CRT setup consisting of an E85-compatible system feeding six 2200cc injectors.”

Maikel concluded, “I would like to thank our sponsors AEM Performance Electronics, WWR, Gato Performance, Euro Export, Modular Wiring Solutions, and CRT.”

It’s hard to wrap your head around how fast 112 miles per hour is on a personal watercraft, so to help, we’ve included exclusive footage of the legendary speed pass graciously provided by Adam Barbanell who was on hand at this weekend’s Hydrodrags:

2014 Greenhulk.net Hydrodrag Results

HYDRO N/A
1. Clay Barbee
2. Rich Block
3. Tonito Lopez

HYDRO STOCK
1. Stan Hightower
2. Scott Rice
3. Brett Nance

HYDRO SPEC
1. Kerry Hibdon
2. Stan Hightower
3. Chuck Germany

HYDRO SUPERSTOCK
1. Kerry Hibdon
2. Stan Hightower
3. Brett Nance

HYDRO UNLIMITED
1. Kerry Hibdon
2. Stan Hightower
3. Carlio De Valle

RIVA Racing Speed Alley

Hydro N/A
1. Tonito Lopez 71
2. Clay Barbee 66

Hydro Stock Speed Alley
1. Scott Rice 81 80
2. Kristian Izchazo 81 78
3. Carlito De Valle 63

Hydro Spec
1. Ron Allision 58 (broke)

Hydro Superstock
1. Brett Nance 97*
2. Ross Niemoeller 95

Hydro Unlimited
1. Maikel Gonzalazes 112**
2. Rayge Sanchez 108
3. Carlito De Valle 101

· **IJSBA World Record
· *New Records
· First time that three Unlimited racers go over 100mph

In yesterday’s news report on Art Burgess training on his amazing $50,000 custom-built freestyle ski, we attributed much of the evolution of the sport of freestyle to the machines themselves. While that might be true, it is slightly disingenuous particularly towards the level of athletes that populate modern jet ski competition.

To really hammer the nail in this argument, we want to present what we consider possibly one of the greatest feats of pure athleticism, talent and skill – the double backflip. Executed by France’s most famous freerider Pierre Maixent, he was filmed in 2008 successfully performing the first double ever landed on a jet ski.

Even today, few can perform the double backflip, and all honor Maixent for being the first to master it. Even as machines become lighter and more powerful, the double backflip eludes many and it’ll probably be a good while before we see another do so with Maixent’s flare.

Oh how things have changed since the early days of Freestyle. In fact, it’s only in the world of closed course racing that people decry where the sport has gone. Freestyle, freeride, offshore racing and many, many other branches of jet ski performance have evolved into new and exciting sports in their own right. But we have to say that we see an exponential maturation within freestyle unlike anywhere else.

The machines of today’s freestyle athletes are unlike anything imagined twenty years ago. Made from lightweight carbon fiber and Kevlar composites, weighing fractions of what skis once did and delivering far more thrust and torque than even the gnarliest of close course racers years earlier, freestyle is an acrobatic dance that defies gravity and astounds crowds with each backflip, barrel roll and scarecrow.

World champion freestyle rider Ant Burgess was recently caught on camera training on his insane $50,000 custom-built machine over the Easter weekend at Kingsbury Lakes. Mind you Burgess is merely testing the ski out, gaining a feel for how it behaves. But in this routine, Burgess impresses all with a sequence of flips, 360s and six backflips in a row.

One very close call between a high flying stingray and professional surfer Stephanie Gilmore and her Yamaha FX thankfully resulted in little more than a acrobatics show rather than something far worse.

As reported by The Australian, the altercation was captured during the Quiksilver and Roxy Pro held at Snapper Rocks in Australia’s Gold Coast, cameramen captured the short second-long encounter between the female surfer and the ski’s pilot aboard her tow-in runabout and the stingray.

Gilmore was being pulled out for her quarterfinal showdown at the Roxy Pro when the winged stingray leaped several feet in the air, it’s barbed tail whipping in the air close enough for the rider to raise an arm to shield himself before the stingray dove back down into the water.

Personal watercraft riders have had countless encounters with wildlife while riding. Thankfully, nobody was hurt, but this close scrape is a reminder of how to always remain vigilant while riding. You never know what’s going to jump at you.