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Blogvent Day 22: Powerboat P1 aims for bumper season with 22 teams

Sport

We haven’t devoted much time to the spectacle that is the Powerboat P1 Championship, but with just three days before Christmas it is time for us to push the boat out. P1’s chairman, Asif Rangoonwala, recently highlighted his ambitious plans for the series in 2010 and he is certainly bullish about its prospects with his expectations set on ‘no less than 22 teams’. But what do you know about P1 as a sport?

Well a lot of you will have seen P1 in action. The championship has garnered a whopping 510 hours of television this year across 182 countries, but it still remains a racing series of largely untapped PR potential. The awesome sight of these high octane powerboats zipping across the waves automatically gives P1 a certain gravitas that any aspiring James Bond or Monaco F1 fan can associate with and behold. Excitement and thrill of the chase is captured over an exhilarating Grand Prix of the Sea weekend, accompanied of course with the obligatory glamour girls and VIP hospitality. It’s an appealing draw for fans of all ages.

Its roster of hosting countries is also alluring for teams, sponsors and P1 itself with Croatia set to kick off next year’s championship. It has hints of F1 and hints of other water sports yet P1 has its own distinct flavour. It’s a hugely PR-able series but it is a not a sport that immediately appeals to the majority, so a concerted PR drive is needed if it is to continue its transition from rich man’s hobby to international sport.

Rangoonwala sets out an attractive stall. “We want to continue building the sport from the ground up,” he told the P1 website recently. "That will mean working with the UIM, going to the grass-roots, working with yacht clubs and marinas, federations in local countries with a view to building some kind of national league system where you start with a mini-league, then onto major league and then finally national league (...) We need to upgrade the teams. Don't get me wrong, man-for-man, these teams could beat anyone in the world because of the experience they have backing them. But they need assistance in terms of upgrading themselves in terms of technology and even discipline. I say this openly, but by the end of next year, I see these teams are 'Super Teams'. There is not one powerboat racer in the world who will not want to compete in the Powerboat P1 World Championship."

The potential of P1 is huge but for all its ambition, opportunity and excitement, it needs to feed off inspiration and success from other racing championships to help them grow at an even faster rate of knots.

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