Powerboat fans in for swell time off Napier

The Napier Offshore 100 powerboat race in 2019. Photo / Paul Taylor.

An offshore powerboat racer has no qualms in tackling Napier’s Offshore 100 despite having a boat wrecked in the notorious conditions.

Mike Gerbic returns on Saturday for the country’s longest-surviving powerboat race, which starts at 11am.

The Napier event, which attracts mainly Queen’s City racers, is being revived after a three-year lapse caused by Covid-19.

Gerbic recalls hitting the swells on the race’s back leg - from off Napier Port, towards Bay View - about six years ago.

The Napier Offshore 100 poweboat race in 2019. Photo / Paul Taylor.

When the boat rounded the north point to head south along Westshore Beach, the hull “delaminated”.

After limping back to race headquarters in Napier’s inner harbour, an inspection revealed its racing days were over.

“Over. Off to the tip,” Gerbic told Hawke’s Bay Today, as he looked forward to racing the latest vintage of Espresso Engineers team boats.

As the New Zealand Offshore Powerboat Association focuses on Napier to get its annual drivers’ championship series moving again, Gerbic is back, undaunted, and says: ”The swells were four metres one year”.

The Napier race hasn’t taken place since 2020, but it has a history dating back to the 1970s.

A vantage point at the Napier Offshore 100 powerboat race in 2018. Photo / Paul Taylor.

Other races are on sheltered courses such as Lake Taupo, or harbours or firths.

The Hawke’s Bay challenge attracts racers as it is regarded - as a prominent driver once said - as the “only true offshore race in the series”.

Large catamarans of more than 14 metres, from as far as Australia, had raced in the past, but the current fleet is limited to about 10 metres.

NZPBA president Paul Greenfield says Napier, race five in a six-race series this year, is one of three the association is keen to foster, because of the history, and conditions.

The crews arrive in Napier on Friday and will be based at the Hawke’s Bay Sports Fishing Club, with the boats parked for public viewing on the neighbouring reserve.

The racing is best watched from Westshore, from the points at the entrance to the inner harbour, the Hardinge Rd foreshore and the sweep towards the port entrance.

Among the fleet is Red Steel, raced by now retired Napier racer and former national drivers champion Tony Carson, who also raced with Auckland-based brother Wayne Carson.