Global Warmer To Boil The Water Again – Speed on the Water

Offshore racing fans, especially of the Fountain Powerboats kind, will have no trouble recalling Global Warmer, a canopied 42-foot Fountain V-bottom that was owned by Dan Davies. The Chicagoan shared the boat’s cockpit with Martin Sanborn from 2008 to 2011 in the Production 1, Super V and Super V Extreme classes under the Super Boat International umbrella. Davies sold the boat after getting out of the sport and the V-bottom is now in Trinidad.

But he never forgot it.

Once a 42-foot Fountain raceboat, Global Warmer will be reborn as a 43-foot Outerlimits pleasure boat thanks in large part to Stephen Miles Design.

“I always missed that boat—it was my favorite boat, ever,” Davies said. “I don’t miss racing. I don’t regret selling it. But I have always missed it.”

Now Davies is reinventing Global Warmer as a pleasure boat in the form of a canopied 2008-model-year Outerlimits Offshore Powerboats SV 43 bottom currently powered by Mercury Racing 1075SCi engines. He bough the boat dubbed Holy Smokes III, which was painted by Dean Loucks of The Art Of Design in Elkhart, Ind., earlier this year

Davies he plans to repower the boat with a pair of Mercury Racing engines and is deciding what that powe package will be. But he does know that Stephen Miles Design will the boat’s new Global Warmer graphics paintjob.

“We are bringing back Global Warmer as an Outerlimits,” Davies said.

The original Global Warmer Fountain was well-known in offshore racing circles. Photo by Pete Boden courtesy/copyright Shoot 2 Thrill Pix.

A Stephen Miles Design fan, Davies reached out to the Owensboro, Ky., graphics man. Miles is a rabid longtime offshore racing fa and he immediately recalled the original Global Warmer..Soon after their discussion, he created renderings for Davies based on the raceboat’s paintjob, but with a more-contemporary flair.

“Back in the day, I loved that color combo,” Miles explained. “But it’s a challenge to modernize them today. With the design we have now, I think we really ‘warmed up’ the colors and made the design more ‘today’ than ‘yesterday.’”

The 42-footer will arrive at Miles’ shop in June 2024, where the first order of business will be removing its current paintjob. Missouri-based Nick Mayden of Mayden Design will handle the boat’s interior updates.

Until then, Davies plans to run the boat in the Marco Island, Fla., area, where he and his wife have a second home. He hopes to enlist the services of his friend Brian Forehand, an extensively experienced Fountain and Outerlimits operator. Not only did Forehand, a former longtime Fountain Powerboats employ set the existing V-bottom kilometer record of 180.464 mph in an Outerlimits SV 43, he runs as SV 29 in offshore racing’s Mod V class.

“I’m going to work the bugs out of it,” he said. “I’m going to run it hard and beat on it. I might also run it with Brian a bit to learn more about how to best run it.”