Monday, Jul. 30, 2007

Notebook: Spirit of Detroit takes rough route to final heat

By Jeff Morrow, Herald sports editor

For the third race this season, J. Michael Kelly and the U-13 Spirit of Detroit had to rally to get into a final by winning the Provisional, or Last Chance Heat.

Kelly did it again Sunday at the Lamb Weston Columbia Cup, after his No. 1 motor gave out in Heat 3B.

That didn't give him enough points to automatically qualify for the final. So he had to win the Provisional to get in.

He did, and starting as the seventh - or trail - boat, Kelly picked off three other boats to finish a respectable fourth in the final.

"I'm very happy," Kelly said. "I was hoping to get by at least one guy. But it'd be nice to just make the final without having to win the Provisional."

-- Jimmy Shane's first weekend as an unlimited driver ended early when his gearbox in the U-1 Formulaboats.com got torn up just 200 yards from the finish line in Heat 2A.

"The boat took a big, big hop on that last corner," Shane said. "I heard a pop. It wasn't a loud bang or something like that. But I knew it wasn't good, so I shut the boat down. The same big wave that broke the gearbox, it also broke my butt. The boat hit really hard."

Shane said he felt a vibration in the boat.

"The second I heard and felt that vibration, I switched everything off and pulled all the levers," Shane said.

The current edition of the U-1 is the backup boat, which is normally on display. But when main driver Mark Allen flipped the top U-1 - known as the old T-5 Miss Budweiser hull - in Detroit two weeks ago, the team hurried the backup into play.

"Basically, the team was trying to keep everything together," Shane said. "The whole main goal is to get through Seattle. We'll be OK for Seattle. I just wished the boat had stayed together."

-- Greg Hopp and the U-100 MirageBoats.com team elected not to race in the Provisional after Hopp said he felt a vibration in the gearbox.

"We found it, but it was too late to do anything before the Provisional," Hopp said. "If we would have made the final (after the first three heats) we would have had plenty of time to fix it."

Hopp will be a busy man next week at Seafair, driving the U-100, his Unlimited Light and his G-Boat.

-- Kevin Aylesworth, the co-owner of the

U-21 Meyers' Auto Tech, was excited to have his new boat in the Tri-Cities this week.

The diminutive Aylesworth had driven the old U-21 the past two seasons and had some bad luck in it. It's a violent ride anyway, and Aylesworth spent four days a week for a year working with a personal trainer to get stronger.

In 2005 in San Diego, he flipped the boat and landed upside down. He ingested so much motor oil and saltwater that he was in critical condition for a long time.

Then last year at Seafair, the boat caught on fire and burned to the water line. He was able to get out, but hurt himself diving off the boat.

That's when he decided maybe that was enough in the cockpit.

"God gives you a few chances in life, and I think that was it for me," Aylesworth said. "We went home to San Diego after the fire and spent a month with my family to figure things out."

Aylesworth and co-owner Jeff Johnson decided to build a new boat, and then they hired Brian Perkins to drive.

Perkins qualified as a driver this weekend and performed well.

"We did way better than I thought we would," said Aylesworth, who was ready to drive this weekend if Perkins couldn't qualify.

"And that would have been OK with my family, as long as we have a long-term plan."

-- The Seattle Times reported Sunday that one possible race site for hydroplanes in the future is Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.

Dubai is gaining an international reputation as a sports destination. It already plays host to big money events in horse racing, golf and tennis.

Officials in Dubai are apparantly interested in having the hydros.

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