May 31

May 31 The Offshore Race Season Kicks off: Thunder on Cocoa Beach 2022

By most measures, Thunder on Cocoa Beach was a success and kicked off the 2022 offshore racing season. I had the opportunity to go up to Cocoa Beach and take in the weekend. The conditions were rough on race day and the Florida heat picked up but nothing unexpected. With my Nikon camera, I tried to get some good shots of the teams and some behind the scenes stuff. Let’s take a look at the APBA offshore races in Cocoa Beach.

The newest class, introduced last year, the factory stock 450R class had two competitors this time and there is more to come. The class permits 34’ to 40’ catamarans running stock Mercury Racing 450R engines, and the boats are from stock molds with safety canopies. These are fast, capable of around 130 MPH in perfect conditions.

The crane drops the MTI 390X Race edition in the water.

My favorite class is probably the Super Stock, partly because it’s very competitive and I like the size and power of the boats. Running 28’ to 32’ Cats with 300R or 300XS Mercury Racing engines is really fun. All racing is expensive but this class is a good balance of speed, competitiveness and being more accessible than the bigger classes.

Super Stock boats waiting to go out. The 300R is being adopted quickly. This is a very competitive and popular class. Perfect blend of size and performance.

The V hulls are also really fun to watch, especially on a rough day. Not sure I’d want to be in the cockpit on a day like race day but it makes for a spirited outing. You can see clearly why Cats are so popular, they really outperform similar sized V hulls on these days. I still love the V hulls though.

The Super Cats were really exciting and a great showcase on a rough day. Lots of Skaters in the Super Cat class.

Skaters seem to dominate the Super Cat class. Not too surprising as this size is Skaters bread and butter.

Seeing plenty of Class 7 (bracket class 700) boats was great too. These guys are the spirit of racing, driving their rigs from all over, competing hard in every conditions and having fun along the way. The smaller boats are what I grew up on and it is how many get their start. There are some guys running newer 300Rs on their boats, which is pretty exciting.

An old Hustler 21 and a Battlewagon 21 Savage run down the beach in the Class 7 class, up to 22’ and 300 HP.

I might try to get to more racing events if I can. Generally we don’t cover the races from a news perspective, Speed on the Water and Speedboat do a great job of that, so there’s no need for me to do it. And, I’d rather just take some pictures and take it in.

John Tomlinson and Taylor Scism running in the factory stock 450R class, team MTI.

One thing I noticed is that although I’m sure there could always be more interest, the competitors were a range of ages with some serious competitors that are under 25 years old. This is great for the sport and hopefully keeps growing.

Official results: P1 Offshore