Commentary: Two For The Books – Speed on the Water

Where were you when Mike Fiore died? It happened nine years and one day ago after an accident at the 2014 Lake of Ozarks Shootout, but if you’re a devout high-performance boating fan you likely remember the day the 44-year-old founder of Outerlimits Offshore Powerboats suddenly left us.

So where were you? And what were you doing?

Jim Schultz and Mike Faucher ran the Factory Billet Outerlimits into the record books yesterday at the 35th annual Lake of Ozarks Shootout. Photo by Pete Boden copyright Shoot 2 Thrill Pix.

I was coming home from a Tuesday night dinner with my son, Alex, then 19 years old and a journalism major at the University of Oregon. A few days earlier he had come with me to the Lake of the Ozarks to see firsthand what his dad does for a living.

In one awful moment, he saw the serious side of what his dad does for a living.

That was then, and it’s never far from memory, especially this time of year. But just yesterday—on the anniversary of his death—Mike Fiore’s legacy was on full and joyful display in not one but two countries.

In yesterday’s Cowes-Torquay-Cowes endurance race, Miles Jennings became the winningest competitor in the history of United Kingdom event.

A few hours after Jim Schultz and Mike Faucher ran the 51-foot Factory Billet Outerlimits V-bottom to a mind-bending 184 mph, Miles Jennings and Drew Langdon ran Silverline, a 43-foot Outerlimits V-bottom, to victory in the Cowes-Torquay-Cowes endurance race off the coast of England.

Schultz and Faucher became the fastest V-bottom pilots in the world. Jennings notched his seventh Cowes victory, making him the winningest competitor in the history of the 182-mile endurance contest. It was a great day, not just for three men and the Outerlimits brand but for the 30-year-old company’s entire family of employees and customers.

And it all started with a guy we lost nine years and one day ago.