We have to thank Scott Clark for the tip on this great video showing the Aussie Sprint Boat called War Hammer making what looks to us like a perfect run in competition. These things are mental and if you are not familiar with how the sport works, the teams are given the course “map” the night before the race and they spend the night studying the winding route before hitting it full force. These are little aluminum boats with engines making way more tan 1,000hp and because they are jet boats they turn like few other things on Earth. It doesn’t seem possible to do what these people do, but there it is for all to watch!
As much as the mechanical end of the boats is cool the human element is really what blows us out of the proverbial pond here. The dude on the right is basically using his or her hand as a flapper to point the driver in the direction that they need to go. Hesitation or mistakes here cost teams either a good lap time or they cost teams a boat, their health and well-being and likely a few years off their lives. When these things crash, they CRASH. The tire lined sides of the course have some bumper ability but the sharp V-shaped hull means that if a boat hits one of the course “islands” had on, it launches airborne like the world’s worst plane.
You are going to see a perfect example of how this support is supposed to be done here. This looks flawless. Between the human guidance system and the driver who is as talented as he is fearless, this is a kind of violent poetry in motion.
That looks like a lot of fun. Wonder how much one of them beasties cost?