PowerboatRacingWorld´s Contributing editor, Chris Davies attended the party, and together with with the Glitz and Glamour was once again a reminder that the pamdemic is not over.

Chris told me this morning;

Its no more parties for me. Apparently a lot of the others participants got it as well, not only me..  It only took a few days to knock me out, and now its Covid in the house.

Even though we work a 1000 miles apart, at present the whole team behind PowerBoatRacingWorld is suffering. The office in Norway and the UK office is affected with positive tests. Due to this we will not be able to cover the Xcat event in Fujairah like we wanted. We had planned to have a reporter in the pits, but its just not possible.

We hope to be back stronger in short time. Remember, stay safe !

The PRW team have not only been busy in the office here in Tonsberg, but we’ve also been very pro-active overseas. We attended the final two rounds of the UIM F1H2O World championship in Portugal, along with the final two rounds of the XCat World Championship in the UAE.

Whilst we were there, we also went along to the final race of the F4 UAE International Championship in Abu Dhabi and the final event of the UAE Aquabike Championship also held in Abu Dhabi.

During our UAE tour we were able to have productive meetings with the Marine Clubs based in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Fujairah and Sharjah and we will work with them in promoting and reporting on their race events.

PRW has strengthened our working relationship with RaceWKND in Finland. The team behind the successes in Finland are one of the hardest working ones we have come across in Europe. You might have read about their Gala Dinner and plans for the 2022 on our site, there are plenty more articles to come. Nuppu and Johannes have developed a culture of social media engagement which amongst race promoters is second to none. We can see it in their numbers plus the stories we write about RaceWKND are always top of our ‘share’ list. When you look at their entry lists and see current World Champions competing in their series, we can see the future of the sport looks good.

Like many, the PRW team can’t wait for this year’s race seasons to start. The ‘offseason’ has certainly allowed us to focus on how we can be more efficient. Though when we start looking at racing calendars and see events we want to cover happening on the same weekend, which is always going to happen when you’re trying to cover a multi discipline sport, our thoughts turn to whether we need a slightly bigger team of contributors. If you’re a racer, race organiser or series promoter and would like to work with us, please get in contact as we are starting to confirm where we are heading to this year.

Thanks to those who have contributed these last few months with ideas, stories, and images. We get it, just like the way the sport is run most of this work has been done on a voluntary basis. Without your contributions though the site would be a lot worse off and thanks to you when we look at the statistics for January 2022 it was an all-time high which is incredibly motivating to see, and we will continue to work hard.

So, I guess we can say like Mercury Racing, ‘The Race Never Stops’ and neither shall we.

The involvement of Sir Thomas Sopwith in England and Jack Manson and Gar Wood on the American scene brought a new professional edge to this emerging competition and the Harmsworth Trophy and Gold Cup competitions sparked the public imagination in much the same way as the Schneider Trophy international air races had.

By 1917, the Americans were running ten races a year in locations from Miami to Key West, Palm Beach, Havana, and New York. In Europe though the vagaries and traumas of changing presidents and offices almost annually with its attendant inefficiency led to the collapse of the AIYA in 1918.

Then in 1922, largely due to the lobbying efforts of Sir Morton Smart, GCVO, DSO from the British Motor Boat Club and John Ward,

an expatriate Irishman living in Belgium saw the formation in Brussels of the precursor of today´s modern administration in the new Union Internationale du Yachting Automobile with Ward as its first Secretary General and the Belgian businessman Alfred Pierrard its first President.

By 1927 it had acquired a permanent administrative base, had circulated its first sporting rules, published its first racing calendar and after a further change of name to the now familiar Union Internationale Motonautique (UIM) was ready to welcome more nations into its fold. Among that first intake were Argentina, Belgium, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Holland, Ireland, Monaco, Norway, Poland, Sweden and finally the United States of America.

Now to commemorate the centenary of the UIM, a special anniversary logo has been launched and will be used throughout the entire 2022 season to celebrate one hundred years of excellence in the sport of powerboat racing.