Off the back of a fantastic close to the 2023/24 Championship on the Gold Coast back in late July, the Australian Offshore Superboats were back in action for the start of the new season as part of the annual ‘Fast and Loud Festival’ at Lake Macquarie on the New South Wales Central Coast in late October, signalling a reset for many of the teams intent on defending their national crowns.

In front of a big passionate crowd, many of whom were enjoying the hospitality of the Lake Macquarie City Council and all the festivities of the ‘Fast and Loud Festival’ held along Warner’s Bay, teams enjoyed a mix of conditions across the two days of racing, with the 2023/24 Champions battling hard against a number of new and return entries to the category.

Four categories were again on the card for Lake Macquarie; Supercat Extreme for the big, outright enclosed cockpit Catamarans like 222 Offshore/Boost Mobile and ACME Racing machines that feature twin inboard big-block V8s capable of over 800bhp each pushing them to speeds of more than 130mph [210kph] or the Supercat Outboards that feature similar, but shorter hulls with twin 300-horsepower outboards capable of pushing boats beyond 115mph [185kph].

The Supersports 85 ‘speed bracket’ category sees boats limited by GPS to 85mph [135kph], they are open cockpit boats with as much as 700-horsepower. Like the Supersports 65 category, these boats are regulated on speed, so whilst horsepower is important, if they ‘break out’ of their speed bracket, penalties arise that can drop them down the finishing order and cost valuable championship points. The beauty of the speed bracket classes is that they can attract boats from various disciplines, including social boats and ski racing machines, allowing for complete novices to play a part in the excitement, bottom line is though, it makes for some very entertaining racing.

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ROUND#1
Ultimately the Supercat Extreme win was taken by Darren Nicholson and Peter McGrath in the Boost Mobile/222 Offshore entry that had claimed the title last season, the 2023 World Class 1 Champions unbeatable in the outright category after technical setbacks for ACME Racing’s Tom Barry-Cotter and Andrew Searle.

In Supercat Outboard, reigning title holders Antony De Fina and Matt Kelly took three wins from three starts to open their ledger in fine form, although the results sheet doesn’t tell the full story, ‘The Mantis’ having to dig deep in the second race to overcome Mike Ratcliffe and Karl Wall in their new ‘Shifty Cat’, the brilliant yellow ‘The Sting’ holding point for the bulk of the second 30-minute race.

For reigning Supersports 85 Champions Mick and Jason Kelly, they too were forced to work hard, overcoming a strong early advantage for Mark Pecherzewski and Melanie Nelson who faced an intermittent issue that sidelined them in races two and three, despite setting the early pace, whilst in Supersports 65, Harry Bakr and Shane Paton emerged with a trio of wins to perfectly kick off the new season with a solid haul of points.

Supercat Extreme
Despite a number of the outright boats being sidelined for the round as they prepare for a return later in the season, there was an air of expectation with the news that former Champions Tom Barry-Cotter and Andrew Searle would team up in the ACME Racing ‘Maritimo’ in an effort to take the fight to reigning champions Darren Nicholson and Peter McGrath. Admitting that they were committed to fighting for the championship, Barry-Cotter urged some caution explaining that the team were still in a development phase.

“We’re still learning the boat, everything is pretty new, so it was a bit of a test for us as well,” Barry-Cotter explained. “It was a bit disappointing to have the engine problem, but it’s a new boat and team that we’ve only just put together so to get the points for the Championship was the main thing and we managed to do that.”

Ultimately Barry-Cotter proved correct, the team forced to play second-fiddle during Saturday’s opening race before being forced to withdraw early during Sunday morning’s second heat, a broken rocker in the engine the culprit. With just a couple of hours between races two and three, Andrew Searle admitted that whilst they might just be able to wing it, that they’d do their best to combat the issue without changing the engine. Sadly time was against them and despite working until the final moments ahead of the start, they were forced to withdraw and watch the action unfold from the bank.

“All the planning and all the scheming and nothing ever pans out the way you expect,” Andrew Searle admitted post-event. “We weren’t on the pace for the opening race so we had a good hard look at all the data overnight and were planning to go hard in race two, but sadly we broke a rocker and whilst we have two spare engines in the truck, you can’t change an engine on a Sunday. This is only our second time in the boat [alongside Barry-Cotter] so not the way we wanted to start the Championship, but we’ll bounce back.”

For Nicholson, his Lake Macquarie result was the perfect preparation for a run at the World Championship event at Key West in the US in early November ahead of a return to Australia to contest round two of the Series at Wyndham Harbour on February 22-23.

Supercat Outboard
Like Nicholson and McGrath, reigning Supercat Outboard Champions Antony De Fina and Matt Kelly enjoyed their own clean-sweep of the three races, but unlike the ‘Boost Mobile’ machine, ‘The Mantis’ team were forced to work hard for their three wins.

Debuting a new ‘Shifty Cat’ hull, Mike Ratcliffe and Karl Wall turned in a solid opening race on Saturday in the stunning bright-yellow ‘The Sting’, before charging off the line in race two to take a strong lead over the reigning title holders, De Fina and Kelly forced to dig deep and charge over the final two laps to just sneak ahead at the chequered flag admitting afterwards that it was tighter than they’d hoped..

“We didn’t know what was going to happen his weekend,” De Fina admitted. “We’ve got the new boat, ‘The Sting’ there – it’s a fast boat, and while we managed to win it wasn’t straight forward. That second race, they got ahead of us off the start and I said to Matt [Kelly] with about five minutes to go that – we’ve got to work something out here to get around these guys – and we managed too, it was great racing.”

Sunday’s third race delivered much of the same result as the opening race, with De Fina and Kelly getting a much better run off the lien to lead from start to finish, Ratcliffe and Wall a close second with Steve Lancaster and Craig Dove again third in the ‘DLR Offshore’ ‘Horton Aluminium’ machine.

Sadly for Scott Richardson and Steve Kelly, their efforts to improve on a third-placed finish in the 2023/24 Championships were thwarted early, a broken gearbox sidelining them in practice, ongoing issues as a result of the failure forcing an early retirement for the ‘TCR Racing’ entry.

For the reigning champions though, Lake Macquarie delivered all they’d hoped for, cementing a solid start to their title defence.

“This is a real driver’s circuit at Lake Macquarie and you’ve got to be on your game every corner,” De Fina explained. “You’ve got to be on the throttle and off the throttle at the right time, take the right apexes and the right lines, it’s a great track, we love it.”

Supersports 85
From the outset it looked very much like Mark Pecherzewski and Melanie Nelson were going to open the season with a whitewash of the category, especially with such a dominant opening race, finishing more than 30-seconds clear of reigning champions Mick and Jason Kelly. The race might have been shortened by a couple of minutes to cater for a red flag to recover Danny and Dean Caelli who had been thrown from ‘Villian’ at the 28-minute mark after launching awkwardly over cross-wash. Both were okay, but they recorded zero points for the race and were left with some work to do ahead of Saturday afternoon’s second race for which they were ultimately non-starters.

Whilst they dominated the opening race, the ‘Special Edition’ team of Pecherzewski and Nelson were unable to repeat the dose in race two despite leading early, an intermittent electrical fault sidelining them before half race distance, handing ‘Colonel Racing’ the top honours from Ryan Shan and Scott Kelly (RS Motorsport) with Hayden Warszewski third.

Come Sunday morning, the Supersports 85 boats were all on the water to do battle, but no sooner had they left the ramp than the dramas started. ‘Special Edition’ was sidelined from the get-go with ongoing electrical issues, whilst for ‘Colonel Racing’ they suffered a similar issue on the opening lap. They lost a lap in resetting the onboard systems, and once mobile were comfortably quickest in class, working relentlessly to get themselves back to the pack over the following 20 minutes to cross the line second, just 42-second back from eventual race winners Ryan Shan and Scott Kelly – it had been an epic run.

Ultimately the reigning Champions were crowned round winners, but hold only a four point advantage over the ‘RS Motorsport’ team, with Warszewski third, Pecherzewski and Nelson a distant fourth, but still well and truly within reach of the title.

“We had an oil bottle issue in that third race which was unusual,” Mick Kelly explained. “During the parade lap [ahead of the start] an alarm started going off on the dash – we made it three quarters of a lap before it went into guardian mode and wouldn’t run over 2000rpm so we stopped. Fortunately the oil bottle started filling up again and it was perfect for the rest of the race, but by that time we were well behind. That cost us the win, but we came through for a second place, so it was a good result overall.”

Supersports 65
A strong field of Supersport 65 entries arrived at Lake Macquarie all looking for valuable Championship points and an opportunity to press for the 2025 title, especially off the back of the absence of reigning champions Patty and Michael Paczkowski, but despite all the potential challengers, it was Hary Bakkr and Shane Patton that emerged with a trio of wins, the Victorians untouchable in all three races.

Second during the opening race was ‘All Coast Marine’s’ Aaron Jackson, whilst Greg Walters (HUN74) and Matthew Simpson/Kai Tee (PFM Revolution) shared the runner-up positions across races two and three.

Ultimately the round win and maximum points went to the ‘Nut Case’ crew, Bakkr and Paton taking their ‘Razorcraft’ to 105 points to be comfortably clear of Jackson (82), Simpson (52) and Walters (30), the Caelli team making a recovery in the final race to claim third.

“Race one was really, really good, race two was even better, race three was a bit lumpy and challenging, but overall it was good,” Bakkr admitted. “Shane [Patton] is monitoring the GPS the whole race to make sure we don’t go over-speed [and incur a penalty], so he shouts at me over the intercom if we’re ahead of where we’re supposed to be, and I back off and get back onto it where I need to.”

For the teams, focus now turns to Port Phillip Bay’s Wyndham Harbour for the second round of the season, a season which will feature both national and international television exposure.

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R1. 2024/24 Australian Offshore Superboat Championships
Lake Macquarie, NSW (19-20 October, 2024)

RND#1 – Race#1
Supercat Extreme
1. Darren Nicholson/Peter McGrath (#222 Boost Mobile) – 00:30:50 (12-laps)
2. Andrew Searle/Tom Barry-Cotter (#441 ACME Racing) – 00:31:37 (12-laps)

Supercat Outboard
1. Antony De Fina/Matt Kelly (#22 The Mantis) – 00:31:50 (11-laps)
2. Mike Ratcliffe/Karl Wall (#99 The Sting) – 00:32:15 (11-laps)
3. Steve Lancaster/Craig Dove (#81 DLR Offshore) – 00:32:00 (10-laps)
4. Scott Richardson/Steve Kelly (#161 TCR Racing) – DNS

Supersports 85
1. Mark Pecherzewksi/Mel Nelson (#07 Special Edition) – 00:25:56 (8-laps)
2. Mick Kelly/Jason Kelly (#161 Colonel Racing) – 00:26.30 (8-laps)
3. Ryan Shan/Scott Kelly (#888 RS Motorsport) – 00:26:53 (8-laps)
4. Hayden Warszewski (#C52 C-52) – 00:28:05 (8-laps)
5. Anthony McEnally/Darren Tickell (#36 Watersports Marine) – 00:28:07 (8-laps)

Supersports 65
1. Hary Bakkr/Shane Paton (#17 Nut Case) – 00:25:04 (6-laps)
2. Aaron Jackson (#11 All Coast Marine) – 00:25:54 (6-laps)
3. Greg Walters (#72 HUN74) – DSQ
4. Matthew Simpson/Kai Tee (#96 PFM Revolution) – DSQ
5. Danny Caelli/Dean Caelli (#300 Villian) – DNF

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RND#1 – Race#2
Supercat Extreme
1. Darren Nicholson/Peter McGrath (#222 Boost Mobile) – 00:32:24 (12-laps)
2. Andrew Searle/Tom Barry-Cotter (#441 ACME Racing) – DNF (2-laps)

Supercat Outboard
1. Antony De Fina/Matt Kelly (#22 The Mantis) – 00:33:07 (11-laps)
2. Mike Ratcliffe/Karl Wall (#99 The Sting) – 00:33:23 (11-laps)
3. Steve Lancaster/Craig Dove (#81 DLR Offshore) – 00:32:49 (10-laps)

Supersports 85
1. Mick Kelly/Jason Kelly (#161 Colonel Racing) – 00:32.59 (10-laps)
2. Ryan Shan/Scott Kelly (#888 RS Motorsport) – 00:33:08 (10-laps)
3. Hayden Warszewski (#C52 C-52) – 00:34:16 (9-laps)
4. Anthony McEnally/Darren Tickell (#36 Watersports Marine) – DNF
5. Mark Pecherzewksi/Mel Nelson (#07 Special Edition) – DNS

Supersports 65
1. Hary Bakkr/Shane Paton (#17 Nut Case) – 00:33:38 (8-laps)
2. Greg Walters (#72 HUN74) – 00:34:37 (8-laps)
3. Aaron Jackson (#11 All Coast Marine) – 00:34:39 (8-laps)
4. Matthew Simpson/Kai Tee (#96 PFM Revolution) – 00:35:12 (8-laps)
5. Danny Caelli/Dean Caelli (#300 Villian) – DNF

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RND#1 – Race#3
Supercat Extreme
1. Darren Nicholson/Peter McGrath (#222 Boost Mobile) – 00:30:11 (11-laps)
2. Andrew Searle/Tom Barry-Cotter (#441 ACME Racing) – DNF

Supercat Outboard
1. Antony De Fina/Matt Kelly (#22 The Mantis) – 00:32:40 (11-laps)
2. Mike Ratcliffe/Karl Wall (#99 The Sting) – 00:32:55 (11-laps)
3. Steve Lancaster/Craig Dove (#81 DLR Offshore) – 00:32:39 (10-laps)

Supersports 85
1. Ryan Shan/Scott Kelly (#888 RS Motorsport) – 00:32:44 (9-laps)
2. Mick Kelly/Jason Kelly (#161 Colonel Racing) – 00:33:26 (8-laps)
3. Hayden Warszewski (#C52 C-52) – 00:33:31 (7-laps)
4. Mark Pecherzewksi/Mel Nelson (#07 Special Edition) – DNS

Supersports 65
1. Hary Bakkr/Shane Paton (#17 Nut Case) – 00:34:49 (8-laps)
2. Matthew Simpson/Kai Tee (#96 PFM Revolution) – 00:34:54 (8-laps)
3. Aaron Jackson (#11 All Coast Marine) – 00:35:02 (8-laps)
4. Danny Caelli/Dean Caelli (#300 Villian) – 00:35:14 (8-laps)
5. Anthony McEnally/Darren Tickell (#36 Watersports Marine) – 00:35:45 (8-laps)
6. Greg Walters (#72 HUN74) – DSQ

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R1. 2024/24 Australian Offshore Superboat Championships
Championship Points (after round one)

Supercat Extreme
1. Boost Mobile (105-points), 2. ACME Racing (32)

Supercat Outboard
1. The Mantis (105-points), 2. The Sting (90), 3. DLR Offshore (78). 4. TCR Offshore (0)

Supersports 85
1. Colonel Racing (95), 2. RS Motorsport (91), 3. C-52 (74), 4. Special Edition (35)

Supersports 65
1. Nut Case (105), 2. All Coast Marine (82), 3. PFM Revolution (52), 4. HUN74 (30), 5. Villian (23)

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2024/25 Offshore Superboat Championships – calendar
R1 Lake Macquarie, NSW – 19-20 October, 2024
R2. Wyndham Harbour, Victoria – 22-23 February, 2025
R3. Geelong Harbour, Victoria – 15-16 March, 2025
Further dates and locations released soon.

For more information on the Australian Offshore Superboat Championships, visit us at;
www.superboat.com.au
www.facebook.com/OffshoreSuperboats
www.facebook.com/ausopc

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