Wyatt And Granet In For Class 1 St. Pete Grand Prix Debut With df Young Mystic
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Uncategorized: Wyatt And Granet In For Class 1 St. Pete Grand Prix Debut With df Young Mystic
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When the green flag flies at the St. Petersburg Grand Prix, the fourth contest in the eight-race P1 Offshore-produced Union Internationale Motonautique Class 1 World Championship Series and the sixth of eight races in the American Power Boat Association Offshore National Championship Series, the df Young cockpit duo of Rich Wyatt and Marc Granet will be among the teams in the September 4 contest. The 50-foot Mystic catamaran, which has run in the Unlimited and Extreme classes during the years, last competed at the 2021 Offshore Powerboat Association World Championship in Englewood Beach, Fla., where it claimed an OPA Unlimited-class title.
With veteran offshore racers Rich Wyatt and Marc Granet in the cockpit, another United States-based team is heading into Class 1 competition. Photo from the 2021 OPA World Championships by Pete Boden copyright Shoot 2 Thrill Pix.
To fit into the class, the team will detune the twin 1,400-hp Stotler engines with BPM surface drives powering the 11,500-pound, rudder equipped catamaran to 1,000 hp.
“The df Young team wants to participate in Class 1, but before investing in the new engines they want to make sure the boat is competitive at 1,100 hp,” said Azam Rangoonwala, the chief executive officer of Powerboat P1/P1 Offshore. “Our support with this effort is an investment in the series for next year and on.”
The continued growth of Class 1 this season caught the attention of Granet and Wyatt, who competed in last year’s Offshore Powerboat Association World Championships in Englewood Beach, Fla., and took home an Extreme-class OPA title.
“Rich and I have been following everything going on in Class 1,” Granet, who drives the cat owned and throttled by Wyatt. “We thought, ‘Maybe we’ll run Unlimited in the post-season. But in talking to Gary Stray (the former Miss GEICO crew chief reprising that role for the Class 1 Huski Chocolate team) he said there’s no reason why we wouldn’t be competitive with that reduced power output.
“We figured, ‘Hey, let’s detune the engines, go out and run and see how we do,’” he added. “Rich does love his big power, but he’s all in.
That means if Team Defalco is ready in time with its Outerlimits raceboat, as Class 1 representative/Huski Chocolate team throttleman Steve Curtis believes it will be, there could be six Class 1 teams in St. Petersburg event.
Stuart Halley, the general manager of Mercury Racing, applauded the move.
“Rich and Marc joining the UIM Class 1 Championship in St. Pete is exciting news,” said Stuart Halley, the general manager of Class 1 series backer Mercury Racing. “Marc first mentioned this possibility to me at the start of the season in Cocoa Beach and I am delighted this has now come to fruition. This adds considerable value to the Class 1 series both in terms of competitiveness and its future development.”
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