Around Ireland Race organiser Justin McInerney's Team Pulsar Racing had two boats in this month's inaugural Around Ireland Powerboat Race, a powrboat race that lived up to its billing as a tough one. Reliability and consistency were key components that piad off for Team Pulsar in this powerboat race and resulted in some well-deserved honours.
With two high powered boats entered in the race (Milwaukee Seawolf and Guardian Wolf), Team Pulsar Racing put in a performance over the eight day event, which totalled 800 miles around the beautiful coastline of Ireland.
Milwaukee Seawolf, piloted by Justin Mc Inerney, Chief Executive of Pulsar direct Ltd. and Andrew Varley finished second overall, first in its class. Guardian Wolf, piloted by Derek Stanley and Paul Lewis finished the challenging race in third place overall, and first in the Class D Stock.
“Offshore Powerboat Racing is not for the faint hearted,” commented Justin Mc Inerney, owner of Team Pulsar. “We understand the extremes that our boats come under during these demanding races and therefore have to choose our partners and equipment carefully. This is why we have chosen to stick with proven suppliers who can deliver reliability and durability time after time.”
Team Pulsar Racing has worked closely with several key partners during the many races and record attempts. Choosing the right hull and engine combination might seem logical and relatively easy, however delivering a reliable pairing is a much more complicated matter. Over the years Team Pulsar has chosen to work with the likes of Humber and Suzuki for their racing – delivering impeccable performance and reassuring peace of mind when testing the limits during competitive racing.
“Our boats have to overcome extremely demanding conditions during these marathon races,” exclaims Mc Inerney. “I am completely amazed by the spectacular quality and capability of the Humber Quinquari Offshore Hulls used in both Milwaukee Seawolf (10 metre hull) and Guardian Wolf (8.5 metre hull). Their build quality and sea keeping capabilities combined with over 50 years of RIB building experience gives us hulls we can trust. It is very comforting having a hull you can push to extreme limits knowing that at the end of the race they will be ready for more.”
Team Pulsar Racing has adopted the same attitude to their choice of engines. A pair of Suzuki DF300 outboards powered Milwaukee Seawolf to its impressive finish, with a pair of DF200’s making the difference for Guardian Wolf during the race. Despite the rigorous demands being put on the engines by both the teams and the conditions, not one element faltered.
Mc Inerney states, “As a team, we have done over 8000 miles of racing in the last 24 months. All of it has been at over 5000 revs and the engines have coped amazingly. You can run these engines all day at wide open throttle, as we did for the 19 hours Around Ireland Record in 2009 and when finished they will happily drop back to tick-over as if you had just come back from a leisurely cruise. Other racing specification engines may be faster; however none of them has the same permanent reliability of the Suzuki’s.”
Driving at high speed in just about any sea state requires the best in seat shock mitigation. Again, Team Pulsar has continued its long relationship with world renowned shock mitigation specialists, Shockwave of Canada. Without high quality shock mitigation, racing in challenging conditions over extreme distances is practically impossible.
The Shockwave Offshore Patrol range has been used on Guardian Wolf since 2008 and the team was also one of the first in the world to install Shockwave’s high-tech ICE console onboard Milwaukee Seawolf in 2009.
As a valued partner, Team Pulsar has worked closely with Shockwave on the ICE console and has assisted with several design changes that have enabled Shockwave to further perfect their product. Now used by North American military and navy, the ICE console is amongst the very best technology available on the market today.
During these treacherous, long distance powerboat races, even the best engines and strongest hulls are useless if a team gets lost. Navigation and marine electronics are vital components in offshore racing and something that Team Pulsar takes very seriously, that is why the team has established a long standing relationship with one of the industry’s most dynamic and reliable manufacturers of marine electronics, Raymarine.
“We were appointed Raymarine Ambassadors in 2010 and have continued to work with Raymarine on our boat electronics,” says Mc Inerney. “We look for a combination of great design, ease of use and integration, and of course the ability to withstand extreme conditions. We employ state of the art electronics on both boats using two of the latest Raymarine E120w screens on Milwaukee Seawolf and the new Raymarine C140w screens on Guardian Wolf. The amount of information required when racing is very high and you need to be able to capture this at speed. The screens allow for this and can provide just about any data you need at a glance.”
Building and racing high speed RIB’s that can take the pace and keep on coming back for more is all about quality and build. John Price and the team at Quinquari Marine have developed an enviable reputation for high quality boat building. Specialising in large offshore Humber hulls, John works closely with Humber building commercial specified RIB’s for markets all over the world. This team of specialists are the final piece of the racing preparation jigsaw and continue to deliver excellence time and again.
Team Pulsar Racing will be competing at Cowes Torquay Cowes and other powerboat races throughout the year. Plans are already being made for the next Around Ireland Offshore Powerboat Race in 2014.
