The Gold Cup has been likened to the Indianapolis 500. This weekend in Detroit, Michigan, nine of the fastest hydroplanes in the world vied for the coveted cup. The U13 had, well to say the least an upside down weekend. Not that they had any accident, they were about one of two that was in the Dodge Pits to not receive any major damage.
Friday, J Michael Kelly took the boat out during qualifying and posted several laps in the mid 150mph range. “It got windy, and I like windy. This boat handles the chop well”. With the second most winning hull, the 13 needs just a couple of wins to surpass as the all time winner.
You need to remember to be careful what you wish for, with Fridays chop, Saturday brought even more choppy conditions. With winds out of the west at around 20-25mph. no one was to venture out onto the course. Thunderstorms threatened all day long. With that, Sunday was to be a full day of racing.
Gold Cup rules state that you have to race 60 miles, which meant 6 heats of racing were to be ran on Sunday. And of course, the 13 was to draw the fast boat heat. Up against the 16, 6, 5 and the 37 Kelly had his work cut out for him. “My plan was to keep up the pressure. Make them push hard” stated JMK. And pressure he gave them, passing the 37 he was reeling in the Oberto and the Elam, settling for third place, tremendous work and driving from the 28yo.
The next heat was another barn burner. Drawing the 6, 3 1 and the 5 Kelly in the final lap lost his vertical upright and then was held in the infield for heat 2b because his engine shut down. After returning to the dock Mike had one comment, “IT’S ROUGH”. Banging his elbow with the rough conditions, JMK sported an elbow brace the rest of the day.
The heat that was to be the real upset of the day, after trying to figure out the reason for the engine shut down in the prior heat, Kurt, (crew chief for the 13) decided to just change the motor and worry about that engine later. But, with precious time clicking off the clock, they were scheduled to be in heat 3a. However they could not get the new motor that was just installed to fire. Turned out the fuel filter had issues. This meant that another team would not have to finish allowing them to be in the final. This is not the way that team owner Dave Bartush wants to beat his competition.
After another team decided to bow out for the day ABRA officials informed the team that they are the first alternate. Sitting in the water waiting to see if any of the teams had any trouble, none did, we watched as the grasp of the Gold Cup slipped out of our hands.
Going into the second lap the U5 formulaboats.com driven by Mike Allen was involved in a blow over accident. Fortunately Allen received minor injures. This allowed the team to be the trailer boat in the restarted final.
While in the warm up period, the U5 formulaboats.com driven by Jeff Bernard, did not answer the call. This allowed JMK to go to the front line. After fighting the entire race fending off the U3 Chrysler Jeep driven by Jimmy King, the checkered flag flew and the day that started out good, went to bad, turned out to be great with a third place finish in the Gold Cup.
Owner Bartush stated, “That was one hard earned third place finish. The moon and the stars lined up for us on this one.”
The teams now have a couple of weeks before they assemble in Tri-Cities Washington for the Columbia Cup, the last weekend in July.