Hello Powerboat nation, meet the magazine’s littlest subscriber—Morgan Johnson, my amazingly strong and oh-so-perfect baby girl. OK, maybe I’m biased, but there’s no denying this little one’s fight.

What does this have to do with boating you ask? Not much except I couldn’t help myself and had to take a picture of my precious little girl next to Powerboat last week after she came home from the West Hills Hospital Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) in Southern California. Morgan was a bit unexpected—10 weeks to be exact—but after 5 1/2 weeks of great doctor and nurse care in the NICU, she was able to face the real world and join my beautiful wife and I at home.

At just 3 lbs. 3 oz. at birth, she’s nearly doubled in size (she’s almost 6 lbs.), and as you can see, she’s not much bigger than a copy of the magazine. OK, she weighs more but it’s kind of crazy that something so small can have such an overwhelming effect on your life. I’ve already shared photos and stories from the magazine with her and can’t wait to share more.

Needless to say, our little miracle has kept me quite busy between trips back and forth to the hospital everyday and preparing around the house—and she wasn't even supposed to arrive until the end of August. I’ve missed a couple of boat races and poker runs, but soon enough I’m hoping she’ll be able to join me and I can really introduce her to the fascinating world of high-performance boating.

I’ve received a lot of well wishes via e-mail from folks in the powerboat industry I’ve gotten to know over the past five years. Thanks everyone for including Morgan in your thoughts and prayers. Hopefully you’ll get to meet her at an event soon enough.

I’d also like to apologize for not updating my blog lately. I took a vacation at the end of May, came back to a couple of deadlines … and then wham! My world as I knew it was flipped upside down. I promise more frequent updates from the editorial desk in the future.

With just six weeks until the Suncoast Offshore Super Boat Grand Prix in Sarasota, Fla., I figured this week would be a good time to check in with the crew behind what could end up being the world’s fastest boat come the Fourth of July weekend.

After making its debut at the Key West World Championships in Florida last November and having a huge presence at the Miami International Boat Show in February, Al Copeland’s Phenomenon is getting closer to its attempt to set the propeller-driven speed record. The 56-foot catamaran with four T-55 turbines is set to hit the water on Friday, July 2 during the Super Boat International Kilo Runs, which are part of the Suncoast Offshore Super Boat Grand Prix weekend—one of the most popular events in the country.

Driver Al Copeland Jr., whose father founded the Popeyes chicken chain and was an avid offshore racer, is hoping to live out his father’s wish to break the propeller-driven speed record of 220.43 mph set by Miss Budweiser. Copeland Jr. will be joined by throttleman Scott Barnhart, who oversaw the construction of the 56-footer.

Barnhart said they’ve been doing a lot of testing to make sure they have the right setup in the boat, which has four Arneson drives to harness the 12,000 horsepower the four engines are capable of producing. Given the boat’s size and power, Barnhart said the testing has gone well, but has had a few setbacks.

“Everything has been sent out and is getting refreshed as we speak,” Barnhart said. “Once we get it back, it’s balls to the walls from there. We’ve got some new custom propellers coming from Five Axis (Industries) that hopefully will do the trick.

“Unless something catastrophic happens, we will be in Sarasota,” Barnhart continued. “(Al) Jr. is extremely excited about the attempt—there’s a lot of publicity surrounding it. We’re going to shoot for the overall speed record, but we’ll also be happy to break the SBI record.”

The current Unlimited Class kilo world speed record holder is Dave Scott in his 36-foot Bacardi Silver Skater with a 198.05-mph average and a one-way top speed of 202.905 mph set in 1993. 

All boats of various length and horsepower are welcome at this year’s SBI event.

Maybe I’m jumping the gun, but I’m extremely excited to see how the new Super Vee Light (SVL) class pans out throughout the 2010 offshore racing season. If you haven’t heard about it, check this out:

Last year, the SVL teams agreed to enter the 2010 season as a group and race a series of events with a variety of promoters in order to increase boat count and improve the competition. While the idea to run with Offshore Super Series (OSS), Offshore Powerboat Association (OPA) and Super Boat International (SBI) as one unified front was great in of itself, the timing couldn’t have been better with the establishment of the domestic arm of the Powerboat P1 World Championship.

Basically, Powerboat P1, which announced in April it would not run its European Evolution and SuperSport classes in 2010, decided earlier this year to establish a North American subsidiary to develop three premier V-bottom classes stateside (run with similar power-to-weight-ratio rules). The initial two-year plan, beginning in 2011, was to work with existing organizations and race producers to build up their regional races and represent the three consolidated classes within the American Power Boat Association (APBA) Offshore category.

So here’s the cool part. Not only are the SVL teams going to be bringing more excitement to the race course with the higher boat count, but they also will be competing for a $10,000 prize purse at each race, beginning with the first one in Biloxi, Miss., May 20-23. With nine races on the schedule, that’s $90,000 up for grabs—the largest purse I’ve ever seen for one race class in one season.

The SVL boats, which are single-engine V-bottoms powered by Mercury Racing HP525EFI engines, are currently running under a consistent set of rules for existing North American racing series, but will adopt a set of rules including Powerboat P1’s popular power-to-weight-ratio criteria down the road. The sponsorship is designed to test the waters with Powerboat P1 USA’s model of working with existing race promoters to improve the sport’s marketability, as well as demonstrate the class format so it can be applied to the larger boat classes.

It’s nice to see such a competitive bunch of racers have something go their way. For years, the SVL class has provided some of the highest boat counts and most dramatic finishes. Hopefully the racers’ efforts, as well as Powerboat P1’s, pay off and start a trend in the sport.

And, oh yeah, you didn’t hear it from me, but rumor is a high-profile company plans to debut a new single-engine 30-foot race boat in Biloxi built specifically to compete in the SVL class.

For the past five years, I’ve covered the Formula One racing series for the magazine, and for anyone who has seen the tunnel boats in action, you’ll agree with me when I say there’s nothing like watching the outboard-powered boats race around the course and make those hairpin turns.

With that in mind, I was glad to see the new Formula One PROP Tour kick off its season last weekend in Port Neches, Texas. Led by a few well-known names in the sport, the Formula One PROP Tour was started last fall year after a majority of the F1-ChampBoat Series teams were unhappy with the F1-ChampBoat organizers, who had managed the series for more than five years but had a hard time coming up with funding in 2009.

The good thing is that much of the dissention is behind the drivers, according to veteran driver Chris Fairchild and the 2009 F1-ChampBoat points champion Shaun Torrente, who won the Port Neches event despite damaging his boat during testing on Saturday.

“I don’t see any reason why we can’t all play together this year,” said Fairchild, who is looking forward to a busy 2010 season. “I think we can all go at this knowing that drivers have made mistakes and promoters have made mistakes, and that we all need each other to get through these lean times. The bottom line is we’re going to go where there’s a race—just as long as it meets the requirements of the drivers.”

With five events locked in for the Formula One PROP Tour schedule and another seven tentatively scheduled for the 2010 F1-ChampBoat Series, the teams could have plenty of races to choose from, which could lead to more sponsorship dollars.

“We need races, that’s for sure,” Torrente said from his home in Miami on Monday. “We need to stick together to grow our sport, and just go racing and have a good time.”

From a business aspect, both Fairchild and Torrente agree that the sport needs the marketing efforts that the F1-ChampBoat Series, which has new stockholders, can offer. That said, both were pleased with the professionalism that the first F1 PROP Tour race showed last weekend.

“To tell you the truth, the win was rough for our team,” said Torrente. “We blew a big hole in the boat during Saturday morning testing and had to put the boat aside. RJ West (of Revolution Boats) came by and said he could fix it, and Greg Jacobsen let us use one of his old boats to qualify for Sunday.”

Torrente said his team worked on the boat until 2:30 a.m. on Sunday morning and was back at the race site at 6 a.m. to sand the boat and get it ready for the Final. He gave a lot of credit to all the other teams who pitched in to provide parts to get his boat back on the course.

He also got a little bit of luck when Brian Norman crashed in the first turn on the 38th lap. Torrente was trailing Tim Seebold, who had led from the pole, when the crash occurred and the race was restarted. Torrente managed to beat Seebold to the inside lane on the first turn and held off Seebold for the remaining 12 laps to take the season opener. Finishing behind Seebold for third place was Michael Schubert.

The next stop on the F1 PROP Tour is Bay City, Mich., at the end of June, but I’m hoping we see many of the teams at the F1-ChampBoat Series season opener in Little Rock, Ark., on June 5-6.