Lockyer Adding Historic Cougar Cat To Endurance Raceboat Stable
If all goes to plan, Britain’s Rob Lockyer and his offshore endurance racing teammate Scott Younger will be testing a vintage 40-foot Cougar Powerboats catamaran a week from tomorrow ahead of next Saturday’s 100-plus-mile Lymington Challenge produced by the United Kingdom Offshore Powerboat Racing Association. But “plan” is the operative word for the 1990 model-year cat, which was restored in Australia by Matt Humphreys and is powered by twin 650-hp Sterling Performance engines. The 40-footer was shipped from Australia in February and scheduled to arrive in the United Kingdom in April.
Rob Lockyer and Scott Younger are hoping to campaign this famed vintage Cougar catamaran in the upcoming Lymington Challenge offshore endurance race.
The famous former Class 1 raceboat, which ran as Notareal-Finnscrew, arrived in Southampton last week.
“Matt spent 10 years fully restoring it and bringing it up to Union Internationale Motonautique spec and his dream was to see it back racing in the U.K.,” Lockyer explained. “Hopefully, this is going to come true next weekend.
“Matt has an open invitation to come and race it with me any time,” he added.
Lockyer heads to the United States this weekend to catch the Sarasota Powerboat Grand in Southwest, Fla. His friend Alex Pratt, who shared the cockpit of a 52-foot Outerlimits Offshore Powerboats V-bottom with him during last month’s Cowes-Torquay-Cowes endurance race in the United Kingdom, is driving the Class 1 df Young/Good Boy Vodka boat alongside owner/throttleman Rich Wyatt in the 40th annual Sarasota event.
Plus Lockyer’s pal Simon Williams, the owner of Cortez Cove Marina, has a team competing in the Super V ranks. Williams and his wife, Dee, traveled to the Isle of Wight last month to cheer on Lockyer and Pratt in the Cowes event.
Lockyer knows that he’ll return home to more questions than answers surrounding his Cougar catamaran next week. But he’s in no rush, which makes sense given the time the vintage raceboat took to even arrive in the U.K.
Lockyer now has a catamaran and a V-bottom in his endurance raceboat arsenal.
“Everything is an unknown at the moment as it has not been in the water for years,” he said. “We are putting everything back together. New engines have been installed. We are hoping to have her ready for testing next Wednesday.
“Our plan is to campaign her in the Class 1 Light historic category,” he added. “She should be extremely competitive in that class, and hopefully a lot of fun.”
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