Skater At 50—The World’s Fastest 32
From 1981 through 2000, Rick Bowling of Alamo, Calif., was among the best-known offshore powerboat racers on the West Coast. Bowling won multiple championships in Pacific Offshore Powerboat Racing Association competition. He finished his career in a 1991 model-year, 32-foot Skater Powerboats raceboat he dubbed Gone Again in a nod to his frequent weekend absences from his, Kathy, and their son, Ryan.
Known as the “world’s fastest 32 Skater” for its top-speed shootout accomplishments with owner/driver Kenny Mungle, Gone Again could be back in shootout action next year. Photos by Jeff Helmkamp copyright Helmkamp Photos
Some 10 years after he retired from the sport, Bowling—who now owns a 37-foot Talon catamaran of the same name that spends summers on Lake Tahoe—sold the 32-footer to a likeable Texas gentleman named Kenny Mungle. Mungle asked Bowling for permission to keep the name on the 32-footer, which he planned to repower and use in top-speed competitions such as the Texas Outlaw Challenge and the Lake of the Ozarks Shootout, and Bowling agreed.
Without question, the Gone Again Skater 32 was well-known among true offshore racing fans when Bowling owned it. But starting in 2012 with a 145-mph blast at the Texas Outlaw Challenge, Mungle began building a name of his own. The next year at the Texas event, he posted a top speed of 171 mph.
After the 2013 Lake of the Ozarks Shootout, when the twin 1,500-hp Sterling Performance engine-powered cat reached 177 mph on the then-mile-long course, Gone Again really became a household name among even the most casual observers of speed on the water. And Mungle was the perfect shootout star, a confident but not cocky guy with a big smile and a ready handshake. He was approachable and funny—downright lovable and outright ballsy.
Photographer Jim Winters even crafted Kenny Mungle bobblehead dolls for gifts at the third annual Speed On The Water Key West Bash eight years ago at the Smokin’ Tuna Saloon.
Mungle ran the 32-footer once to Key West, Fla. Photo by Pete Boden copyright Shoot 2 Thrill Pix.
In 2014, Mungle ran 182 mph at the Smokin’ The Sound event and returned to the Lake of the Ozarks event with a 184-mph performance. Speedonthewater.com’s Jason Johnson interviewed him in a video you can watch below or on our YouTube channel.
In 2015—the last year he competed—he ran to 165 mph at the Desert Storm Poker Run top-speed event in Arizona, 181 mph at the Texas Outlaw Challenge and 158 mph at the Grand Lake event in Oklahoma.
And he finished the year with a personal-best, 188-mph blast at the Lake of the Ozarks Shootout.
By 2016, Mungle had acquired the former STIHL team Skater 388 raceboat, renamed it Gone Again—much to the displeasure of Bowling at the time who wanted the name to stick with the 32-footer alone—and planned to use it in offshore racing competition. But health issues and personal obligations kept Mungle mostly sidelined and he sold the 38-footer a few years later. (The cat was last sceen imploding on Lake Michigan as the former Dirty Money Super Cat-class raceboat during the 2023 Great Lakes Grand Prix in Michigan City, Ind.)
Mungle still owns the 32-footer. What’s more, he is planning a return to shootout competition.
“I am putting her back together for 2025,” he said.
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