In a Maryland Heights race this month, a Fenton boat builder hopes to make a big splash
By Bryan A. Hollerbach
Photograph by Rick Stoff
Not too big a splash, though. With a raspy chuckle, Tim Seebold remarks, “You don’t realize how hard that water is until you hit it goin’ over a hundred.”
He would know. The 43-year-old sportsman, who’s competing in the 36th annual Bud Light Championship Grand Prix Boat Race August 4–5 on Creve Coeur Lake, won his first boating championship at 17. Since then, he’s collected many other wins, including four in the “ChampBoat” series—to which the Maryland Heights charity event belongs.
Billed as “the Indy 500 of boat racing,” the series features single-seat powerboats that resemble space shuttles gone nautical. Measuring roughly 17 feet in length and weighing less than 1,200 pounds, they can jump from 0 to 100 mph in just 3.5 seconds; they’re likewise capable of reaching a top speed of 140 mph, taking 90-degree turns with ease and spraying 150-foot-long roostertails. But the boats can also barrel-roll across opponents or pinwheel through the air—there’s no shortage of spectacle. In the series’ May opener in Augusta, Ga., in fact, officials sank an engine to snuff a boat-destroying blaze.
Race-ready, such craft cost $80,000 apiece, according to Seebold. And here again, he’d know; the Osage Beach resident operates the Fenton boat-building company Seebold Racing. Incidentally, the company’s prior operator—Seebold’s father, Bill Jr.—previously enjoyed a distinguished racing career himself and now chairs the Maryland Heights race, which is sponsored by the Concord Village Lions Club and Professional Fire Fighters of Eastern Missouri.
Fuel for Thought
Landlubbers blubbering about paying $3 to $4 for a gallon of regular gasoline should cool their jets. Seebold’s powerboat, No. 16, burns 100-octane race fuel similar to what’s used in NASCAR competitions—and it costs a whopping $7 to $8 per gallon.
Hard Water
“Kevlar, carbon fiber and foam coring make up the safety cell, and then we have oxygen onboard,” says Seebold. Also aboard: a protective harness and an airbag system. Why? Well, imagine the collision potential of 20-plus tightly clustered powerboats zooming through a haze of spray. “You can’t always see like you want to see,” says Seebold.
Life Buoyancy
“If I go over and I’m knocked out, it floats [me] out of the water,” Seebold says of his craft’s airbag system. “The Bud Light boat’s the only one in the U.S. that’s running that system.”
Threat Suit
For safety, each racer wears a heavy-duty helmet and a personal flotation device (translation: life jacket) that’s appropriately made of ballistic material and that basically encases the driver’s torso from shoulders to thighs.
Sea Stick
Technically a catamaran, Seebold’s powerboat looks like the head of a giant trident, and at full throttle, it knifes through the water like Poseidon’s own pigsticker. “These things will go around corners faster than any other racing vehicle” in the drink or on dry land, he says.
