WELLINGTON POWER BOAT CLUB INC

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING TO BE HELD ON

SATURDAY 17TH SEPTEMBER 2005 AT 5.00PM

AT THE CLUBROOMS FOLLOWED BY OUR ANNUAL PRESENTATION OF CUPS & TROPHIES

KRB In Aussie

Malcolm Jamieson debuted his new 2005 KRB Formula 1 tunnel boat at Surfers Paradise this weekend for the penultimate round of the FPS Australian F1 Superboat Series.

Malcolm qualified the new KRB boat in second place, a mere 7/10ths of a second behind Dave Trask in his SeaQuest GTR F1.

In Heat 1, Jamieson got off the dock well and led the field into the first turn, but was passed by Trask at the exit of that first pin, from there it was a race long battle, as Malcolm chased hard but to no avail. A great result in her first race "KRB Racing" finished in second place only 100 or so metres behind Trask, and finishing third was Craig Bailey.

Heat 2 was another race long battle between Jamieson and David Trask with Malcolm setting the fastest lap time of the weekend in this heat but again was unable to get past Trask. Again Bailey finished in third position.

Heat 3, Jamieson wasn't as quick off the dock and had to battle his way up to 3rd place behind the race leader David Trask and second placed Craig Bailey.

Jamieson attempted to pass Bailey for second place in the late stages of the race and put his nose down the inside, but unfortunately submarined the KRB boat causing the rear cowl to blow off and the engine took a drink from the ensuing spray. This was the end of the race for Malcolm as the wet engine wouldn't fire and the race was then also red flagged for safety reasons. So Malcolm (we think) recorded a DNF for the 3rd heat.

I believe the final standings for the day were David Trask 1st, Craig Bailey 2nd and at this stage unable to find out who was 3rd overall for the day. This means David Trask now has an unassailable lead in the FPS Australian F1 Superboat Series as they go to the final round.

Well done on a great first outing to Malcolm Jamieson and his "KRB Racing" Formula 1 tunnel boat team. Congratulations to you, it look's like this new boat will be one to watch when it returns here for our summer. Good luck also to you for the final round of the Aussie series at Penrith on October 9th.
 

Annual General Meeting

This is formal notice of the 21st Annual General Meeting of the New Zealand Grand Prix Hydroplane Drivers Club.

The venue is Sun court Motor Hotel Taupo

27th August 2005 at 1pm.

Please forward to the secretary any Nominations and General Business items to the secretary.

If you wish to stay at the Sun court Motor Hotel please contact them directly Ph 0800 786 268
And mention that you are their as part of the Boat racing meetings.

Other Drivers Clubs are also holding their AGM’s at the same venue

Grand National 11 am
Modified Hydroplanes 12 midday
Series 3000 2.30pm

There will be a get together in the bar after the meetings

Kind Regards
Denise Moughan
 

UPDATE - WRONG DATE POSTED, CORRECTED BELOW

NZ Formula 1 Drivers Club AGM
 

Saturday 27th August 2005
Wellington Power Boat Club, Porirua
For details contact Peter Edmond 021-527-811

This is formal notice of the 14th AGM of the New Zealand Modified Hydroplane Drivers AGM.
 

Hi Team,
The venue is the same as last year namely

The Suncourt Motor Lodge in Taupo.
The date is the 27th August 2005
The time is noon.
Please inform all interest parties of the meeting as this year we have hopefully the world championship to discuss on the general business.
Sorry in the lateness of advising you all but was hoping a newsletter was going to be produced.

Regards
Peter McLeod
Secretary
 

Southland Power Boat Club

Hi New Zealand

Yes we are still in existence and growing, with several new boats onboard for the new season.

On the 1^st August our AGM was held and the following voted in:-

Commodore Dave Robertson

Secretary Rose Willis

Treasurer Des Jenkins

Club Captain Alistair Gorrie

Last weekend was the Southland Boat Show and the Southland Power boat Club was there selling memberships and raffles . About 9000 people attended the show and it was a great fundraiser and promotion. A lot of interest in Mike’s new boat as well as Daryl’s little J Class boat with lots of kids going home to talk to mum & dad.

Griffith Cup on TV3
 

Coverage of the 2005 EC Griffiths Cup held at Yarrawonga, Australia in May will be shown on TV3's Sports Arena show this coming Sunday afternoon.  The same show will also appear on both Sky Sport 1 & 2, dates still to be advised and we will let you know as soon as we do.

Kiwi F1 Team To Aussie

3 July 2005

KRB Racing are set to race in the Gold Coast, Surfers Paradise, Australia, on 20 and 21st August 2005 for the 6th round of the Australian F1 Superboat Series with Malcolm Jamieson piloting the new 2005 KRB Formula 1 tunnel boat.

KRB will also participate in the last round of the series in Penrith on 8th and 9th October 2005, with the boat and team returning home to New Zealand shortly after to gear up for the New Zealand season.

There are reports of 15 Australian boats running on a 30 second course with one right-hand turn, so it will be very fast and competitive and also a great testing ground for the latest KRB hull and engines.

The boat has been seen in and around the Picton harbour the last two weekends as the team have been testing and making final adjustments to the boat and engines, and they are very confident that they have a package that will be capable of running with the very best on the Australian circuit.

Keep an eye out here on nzpba.com and the KRB website (via our local links page) for news of Malcolm's assault on the Aussie F1 series. Good luck to Malcolm and his team.
 

Results of GP Hydroplane World Champs, Taree, NSW, Australia.
Round 2, June 25-26 2005

The second weekend of the GP World Champs were a disaster for the three kiwi boats.

David Alexander's "Annihilator 2" had successfully been repaired by the team with help from boat builder Tom Heffernan during the week off and repairs were made to the teams engines by engine whizz Grant Rivers. Testing of all three boats, the primary and back up engines saw the team confident and relaxed after Saturday's test sessions were completed and the team settled into a local tavern to watch the live coverage on the big screen of the All Blacks and the touring British Lions. A great result for the All Blacks with a 21-3 final score, and the NZ GP Hydro team were confidant that they would get a similar result for NZ in the hydroplane championships over the Aussies come race day. But as so often happens in power boat racing, even the best laid plans can come undone!

Ricky Howard's "HyperActive" failed to return after his damage causing spin in testing in the first round and Bobby Fisher again failed to get "Wasp" finished in time. Matt Ferris' "Tattoo" KT Tunnel was ruled ineligible to compete by the UIM as it did not fully fit the definition of a hydroplane so he to was also a no show. This left the field at six boats as it had in the first weekend.

Heat 4a
A great race to get the GP class underway for the day, Warwick Lupton had pole in "Annihilator 1" and took the race to Paul Burton in "Warlord", leading him all the way until he exited the second to last turn. "Annihilator 1" seemed to struggle to pull off the turn as the engine was tying itself up. Warwick attempted to drive to the finish but the engine blew as he entered the last turn. "Warlord" was able to cruise to the finish winning comfortably ahead of Tom Heffernan in "Dragula".

Heat 4b.
This race would see the current leader Paul Cunningham in "GP-55" line up against the other two Annihilator boats and all three boats went into the first turn together. Ken got a little loose and lost a bit of ground but David Alexander in "Annihilator 2" was running right beside "GP-55" until the next turn when his roostertail dropped and he was left parked on the exit of turn two. As David exited the cockpit he noticed smoke and could see flames beneath the engine cowl so fired the extinguisher system and jumped into the water to avoid the fire. Thankfully the fire was smothered by the on board extinguisher, and David who can't swim was in water which turned out to only be knee deep. "Annihilator 3" chased hard but lost a blower belt during the last lap and he too would fail to finish the heat.

So once the race times were collated the final results for Race 4 were:

1st Paul Cunningham "GP-55" 3mins02.13sec 400points
2nd Paul Burton "Warlord" 3mins06.48sec 300points
3rd Tom Heffernan "Dragula" 3mins17.18sec 225points
DNF "Annihilator 1", "Annihilator 2", "Annihilator 3" No points

A very busy time for the Annihilator crew as the engines in both "Annihilator 1" and "Annihilator 2" had too be replaced along with a blower belt on "Annihilator 3" if they were to make it to the start of Heat 5.

Heat 5a
"GP-55" was in pole and went into the first turn first, with "Annihilator 3" right on his hip and overtaking the points leader as they went down the back straightaway. These two battled hard for the whole race side by side. It was possibly the best race of the championship with a finish that had the officials scratching their heads as they were unable to pick a winner as they crossed the finish line. So to the video they went and Ken was awarded the heat win by a mere 1/100 of a second. "Dragula" came home in third and the appreciative crowd gave the boats a standing ovation as they returned to their pit areas.

Heat 5b
Again "Annihilator 1" and "Warlord" were up to do battle but sadly as Warwick left the pit his newly installed back up engine popped and spluttered and failed to clear itself, stopping in a cloud of smoke at the top of the track as the start boat went by without him. "Annihilator 2" ran into the first turn with "Warlord" as David attempted to increase his points but to no avail as he too stopped with a blown engine. This left "Warlord" to circulate on it's own, but he would not take it easy and cruise home, as he set about setting both the fastest lap of the championships as well as the fastest heat time.

So once the race times were collated the final results for Race 5 were:

1st Paul Burton "Warlord" 2mins53.73sec 400points
2nd Ken Lupton "Annihilator 3" 3mins10.46sec 300points
3rd Paul Cunningham "GP-55" 3mins10.47sec 225points
4th Tom Heffernan "Dragula" 3mins25.88sec 169points
DNF "Annihilator 1", "Annihilator 2", No points

The final heats were run as two 2 boat heats as the "Annihilator 1" and "Annihilator 2" teams were now out of engines. The world championship had been won but the race for second was still up in the air between "Warlord" and "Dragula" - their respective race times in the final heat, would decide second place in the 2005 GP World Championship.

Heat 6a
"Warlord" and "GP-55" went into the first turn together before "Warlord" exited the turn in front and they would stay this way till the finish. "GP-55" seemed happy to let "Warlord" go as he already owned the title and saw no need to bust his gear chasing for the race win.

Heat 6b
"Annihilator 3" and "Dragula" went at it for a couple of laps before "Annihilator 3" pulled away. "Dragula" was chasing a race time better than "Warlord" but was unable to go close because as he came onto the front straight for the chequered flag the boat pulled violently into the centre of the track with a steering arm failure. Tom managed to regain control and idle to the finish line, and apart from the eventual winner was the only other boat to complete every heat.

So once the race times were collated the final results for Race 6 were:

1st Paul Burton "Warlord" 2mins55.49sec 400points
2nd Ken Lupton "Annihilator 3" 3mins16.04sec 300points
3rd Paul Cunningham "GP-55" 3mins16.84sec 225points
4th Tom Heffernan "Dragula" 3mins33.02sec 169points
DNS "Annihilator 1", "Annihilator 2", No points

Final Results for the 2005 Grand Prix Hydroplane World Championships

1st Paul Cunningham "GP-55" 1819 Points
2nd Paul Burton "Warlord" 1400 Points
3rd Tom Heffernan "Dragula" 1238 Points
4th Ken Lupton "Annihilator 3" 900 Points
5th Warwick Lupton "Annihilator 1" 700 Points
6th David Alexander "Annihilator 2" 169 Points

A huge congratulations to owner Con Cunningham and his son, driver Paul Cunningham with the "GP-55" boat for their win and dominance of the 2005 World Grand Prix Hydroplane Championship. With the boat the family imported from the USA late last year to replace their previous GP boat "Shamrock", Paul finished every one of his heats and had a buffer of points that could not be caught come Heat 6. Great speed on the water and even better reliability gave this team a well deserved World Title. The boat home in second was Paul Burton in "Warlord", who failed to score points in only two heats and overall showed the best speed at Taree. He set fastest lap and race times at these champs, and scored two wins and two 2nd's in the 4 races he did finish. Third home was Tom Heffernan in "Dragula", the only team to front without a spare engine, who like the winner also finished all six heats, a fantastic effort for a budget team that had a plan to be safe and reliable and it got them to the podium.

For the kiwi team it was a disappointing world champs but the Annihilator boats all showed that they were on the pace. David had the worst of the luck with boat performance, however both Warwick and Ken had race wins and both of the Lupton's' beat the boats further up the table. Ken showed that he has come of age as a driver and was extremely competitive with the best in these champs. He can be very proud of his first full season in the GP ranks. Warwick's boat ran quick and always seemed to have more up its sleeve. He showed true dedication throughout the heats - including doing nearly full two laps with no oil pressure knowing full well the end result on his engine. The Australians were very complimentary of the whole Annihilator camp including praising highly the energy and commitment the kiwi teams put in to promoting the event both in New Zealand and while in Australia, and commenting on the professional conduct of the kiwi race teams. Well done to all the Annihilator teams for a fantastic effort and for being true ambassadors of New Zealand Powerboating. I know we will all be waiting with baited breath for the next time this incredible kiwi contingent take on the Aussies.......!

Results of GP Hydroplane World Champs, Taree, NSW, Australia.
Round 1, June 18-19 2005


Well by all reports an extremely busy weekend for the Kiwi Annihilator team at Taree in their quest for the World GP Hydroplane championship. And a busy week ahead to regroup and repair for the finals next weekend.

Eight of the nine entries fronted for the qualifying on Saturday, with Bobby Fisher and "Wasp" failing to show as they were still trying to get the boat back together. Matt Ferris failed to have "Miss Tattoo" finished in time so fronted up with his 2005 E.C.Griffith's cup winning KT tunnel, in the hope of it being able to run.

Apparently after a lot of discussion, it was decided to allow Matt to run the KT and have the UIM rule on the boats eligibility in the next week. Sadly though during qualifying he damaged his engine and was unable to compete in the weekends racing.

Ricky Howard in "HyperActive" failed to qualify after breaking a steering cable, which caused the boat to spin, thus causing damage to the transom, decks and sponson so was also out for the weekend.

Paul Burton in "Warlord" lay down the gauntlet with a 40.61 second lap early in qualifying and would not be pushed off the pole as the rest of the field ran their hot laps. Warwick Lupton, in "Annihilator 1" slotted into the number two spot with a 42.03. Paul Cunningham in "GP-55" was next with a 44.19 second lap making him 3rd. Tom Heffernan in "Dragula" was close behind in 4th with a 45.43 second lap. Both David in "Annihilator 2" and Ken Lupton in "Annihilator 3" failed to get times, Ken broke a blower belt and David abandoned his lap after feeling a vibration. They would have to start in the last two spots of the heats on Sunday.

The first races heats were set up as follows:

Heat A
"Warlord"
"GP 55"
"Annihilator 2"


Heat B
"Annihilator 1"
"Dragula"
"Annihilator 3"


The points format is that the boats will run in these heats and their race times will determine 1st-6th place after the two heats are run to complete the round. It is this final placing that will determine their points for the round. So a heat win would not necessarily mean that you would score the 400 points, you would still have to be quicker than the boats in the other heat to get the 400. (I hope this makes sense).

Heat 1A looked to be all "Warlord" as she led all the way only to stop as she went into the final turn. "Annihilator 2" battled hard with "GP-55" before having to stop 1 lap short of the finish because of falling oil pressure. Leaving only 1 finisher in Heat 1a "GP-55".

Heat 1B was led all the way by "Annihilator 1" whilst "Annihilator 3" and "Dragula" fought over the 2nd spot, Ken looked to have the upper hand but stopped in the final lap after snapping a propshaft and loosing it, and the attached propeller.

So once the race times were collated the final results for Race 1 were:

1st Paul Cunningham "GP-55" 2mins59.33sec 400points
2nd Warwick Lupton "Annihilator 1" 3mins03.17sec 300points
3rd Tom Heffernan "Dragula" 3mins39.10sec 225points
DNF "Warlord", "Annihilator 2", "Annihilator 3" No points


The boats were now reallocated heats depending on their finishing position from the first race, in the same manner they were placed into the first heats with positions 1,3 and 5 going into the Heat "A" and positions 2,4 and 6 going into Heat "B".

Heat 2A was all "GP-55" who finished nearly 30 seconds ahead of "Dragula" who came home for a second place heat finish. Annihilator 3 failed to start as a gearbox repair was also required following the shaft failure in the first heat.

Heat 2B saw a three lap battle between "Warlord" and "Annihilator 1" before Warwick stopped with a misfire. "Annihilator 2" cruised home in 2nd happy to get a finish and collect some points.

Again the times were checked and the final places and points for Race 2 allocated as follows:
 

1st Paul Cunningham "GP-55" 2mins55.38sec 400points
2nd Paul Burton "Warlord" 2mins55.76sec 300points
3rd Tom Heffernan "Dragula" 3mins24.81sec 225points
4th David Alexander "Annihilator 2" 3mins32.33sec 169points
DNF "Annihilator 1", DNS "Annihilator 3" No Points


The boats were again shuffled into new formats for the final heat of the weekend. All six would be ready for Heat 3 as "Annihilator 3" would now rejoin the battle.

Heat 3A saw "Annihilator 1" and "GP-55" go head to head for two laps before "GP-55" spun letting "Dragula" home in 2nd behind the hard charging Warwick. Cunningham managed to restart "GP-55" and finish the race in 3rd.

Heat 3B saw "Warlord" leading "Annihilator 3" and "Annihilator 2" a lap into the race when "Warlord" stopped on the straightaway, only to have "Annihilator 2" run into the back of him, causing a spectacular accident. Alexander's boat was launched up in the air as it crossed the rear deck of Burton's "Warlord". The race was stopped with Ken Lupton in "Annihilator 3" being given an aggregate race time, and therefore awarded the heat 3B win.

After the clocks were checked the final heat 3 places were:

1st Warwick Lupton "Annihilator 1" 3mins01.23sec 400points
2nd Ken Lupton "Annihilator 3" 3mins12.16sec 300points
3rd Tom Heffernan "Dragula" 3mins19.59sec 225points
4th Paul Cunningham "GP-55" 4mins14.77sec 169points
DNF "Annihilator 2" and "Warlord" No points


So at the end of an eventful first weekend of the 2005 World GP Hydroplane Championships the points are as follows:

Paul Cunningham "GP-55" 969points
Warwick Lupton "Annihilator 1" 700points
Tom Heffernan "Dragula" 675points
Ken Lupton "Annihilator 3" 300points
Paul Burton "Warlord" 300points
David Alexander "Annihilator 2" 169points


Hopefully we will have some pics here in the next few days of the weekends action and a midweek report before the finals weekend. In the meantime check out the great photos that Phil has up on the NZGP Drivers club website and check there also for more info.