Written by DANIELLE KOPACKI
After working all last year and testing at last year’s Nationals, the new 302SS Hydro Stock Outboard class is finally ready to debut this race season. The 302SS gives drivers as level a playing field as its dedicated proponents can create.
“Drivers have no way of messing with the inside of the engine, gaining an unfair advantage because they’re more mechanically-minded than the other drivers,” said Stock Outboard Chairman Jeff Brewster. The 302 Yamato engine will be inspected by Ric Montoya, who will go through the motor, put new piston rings in it and seal it so that it cannot be tampered with.
Along with the sealed engine, Vic Brinkman will be making uniform propellers for the class. Yet, even if the propellers were all different, it won’t necessarily do the drivers any good because of a second failsafe built into the class’s regulations. As stated in the rules, engine owners are entitled to “a” propeller, rather than a specific propeller.
At the drivers meeting, before the race, the propellers are all submitted to the race inspector or a designee. Drivers will draw numbers from a hat to determine which propeller they will drive with. Sabotaging or fine-tuning a propeller does no good, because drivers don’t know what propeller they will end up drawing and could hinder themselves, or help their competitor.
The point of all this regulation is to open boat racing to a margin of people that often lose interest in racing. New drivers often get discouraged when, after racing for a couple years, they find that they cannot compete with drivers that have been racing for 30 years and know all the little tricks to make the boats faster. The 302SS Hydro class gives these drivers the chance to test their skills, rather than their mechanics, according to Brewster.
Another group expected to take interest in this class is older drivers. Years of racing hard and pushing boats as hard as possible gets exhausting, and the 302SS Hydro, which has no age limit, provides a way for drivers to keep competing and enjoying the sport. Hopes are high that the class will snag drivers that would otherwise leave.
“It’s really competitive and it’s more based on their driving skills, on how they compete,” Brewster said. “It’s also very similar to C Stock Hydro because we wanted to make sure that if a new person raced this class for a couple years and decided that he wanted to go faster, then they can easily do that.”
C Stock Hydro, which allows more tweaking than 302SS Hydro, would be the next step up for beginning drivers and can be modified to add up to 8mph to the 60mph permitted for 302SS.
In Region 6, seven people have already bought the engine and are ready to race. This year’s Stock Nationals will have prize money and awards, and will hopefully bring attention to the new class.
“It is our hope that it grows all over the country. We’ve had a good start, but one of our next goals will be to get it going on the west coast and also get it going on the east coast,” Brewster said. “We have a lot of people that are interested, but they don’t want to put the money out and spend the money on it and not have anybody to race against. So once we get the ball rolling, it will grow from there.”
