RICHLAND, WA

Mike is a Tri-Citizen, born in Pasco, lives in Richland, works in Kennewick.   He has been the Board President with the Tri-City Water Follies multiple times, as well as being on the H1 Board previously.

RICHLAND, WA

Darrell and Vanessa Strong spent the first 8 years in the sport of Unlimited Hydroplane Racing as sponsors. During the 2020 off-season they decided to step up as owners, with the goal of creating a benchmark team. Strong Racing has since racked up 10 race wins including 2 Gold Cups in its first 3 seasons. Darrell has served on the H1 Unlimited Board of Directors since 2022.

MADISON, IN

Charlie has been involved with Unlimited racing since the late 1970’s when he joined the Miss Madison team after his uncle was named driver.

He oversees all aspects of the Miss Madison team including: sponsorships, logistics, budgeting, personnel and other administrative duties.

CLE ELUM, WA

Shannon has been involved in racing for decades with husband Scott, and they own the U-11 Unlimited Racing Group team.

EDMONDS, WA

Kelly has been involved with boat racing for decades, as Crew Member, Crew Chief, Driver and Owner. With wife Sharon, Kelly has formed a team that is respected throughout the pitlane as a team that makes the most out of their resources. They set the modern Unlimited speed record in Guntersville in 2023 with a 171.294 MPH qualifying lap – the 3rd fastest in history.

KENT, WA

Dick is a CPA and lifelong fan of hydro racing, Dick is a former editor of the Unlimited NewsJournal. He has also volunteered for over 30 years as a pit tour guide at Seafair.

KENNEWICK, WA

Brad has been involved in radio broadcasting of the sport since 1998, as part of KONA Radio in Tri-Cities. He began broadcasting the Seafair race in 2004 and joined the H1 staff in 2011. Brad is the voice of H1 on the PA and emcees our annual banquet.

RICHLAND, WA

Taryn has been associated with H1 Unlimited since the early 2000’s, stepping away only to begin raising a family. Her depth of experience and knowledge of Unlimited racing is welcomed back to the sport for 2024.

SPOKANE, WA

Don is responsible for driving the H1 truck and towing the rescue boat to every event, setting up the truck for the weekend’s operations and packing it back up again at the end of the event.

LIBERTY, MO

Mark started racing in 1973 and raced outboards with the late Howard Shaw from 1988 until 2001. He has been involved with the Unlimiteds since 1999 and owned a 1 liter hydroplane from 2008-13.

Daughter-in-law Kayleigh Mallory (Perkins) was an Unlimited Lights champion.

WOODLAWN, TN

Jeff is an Inspector, Referee, Region 4 Commissioner and OPC Chief Referee. He has been racing in the APBA tunnel boat class since early 90s and has won many titles, including SST 200 UIM World Champion. 

He joined the H1 Unlimited Staff as Assistant Pit Boss in 2021.

LAKEPORT, CA

Heidi has been involved with APBA since 1995 and works with Region 9 as Officiating Chair for the past eight years. She has been active on  the judges stand for 10 years, and has been a referee across all classes for 8 years.  Heidi is also  very active with the APBA Safety Committee and is APBA Chief Referee for UIM Worlds Jet River Racing 2022 and UIM Sports Commissioner for Offshore.

WOODLAWN, TN

Suzy has been involved in APBA for many years as a team owner, racer, referee and crew chief for multiple teams.  Suzy holds many outboard drag boat racing titles.

She joined the H1 Unlimited Staff for Corral operations in 2021.

ORLANDO, FL

Emily has been involved in Unlimiteds almost since birth, as her parents Scott and Shannon Raney own the U-11 Legend Yacht Transport. Emily is involved in credentialing and contributes to our social media efforts year-round.

CLE ELUM, WA

Ashley has been involved in Unlimiteds almost since birth, as her parents Scott and Shannon Raney own the U-11 Legend Yacht Transport. Ashley does our credentialing at select races.

OLYMPIA, WA

Seph has been involved with hydroplanes since his teen years, having been part of multiple teams as the data specialist in charge of setting up the equipment and reading the data produced during each run. Most recently, he was Crew Chief of the U-9 Jones Racing effort in 2019.

He reads all of the data recorded for N2 speed and fuel flow that is monitored on every boat during every run and is charged with calling penalties for violations based on the data.

CHELAN, WA

John began his career in limited hydroplanes and was an APBA National Champion. He is a legend in Unlimited racing, having been the 1981 Rookie of the Year and the first driver to win in a turbine hydroplane.

After multiple accidents that limited his driving activities, John began his long association with various teams, contributing his knowledge and expertise in fabrication and tuning, leading to multiple National Championships and multiple APBA Gold Cup wins.

Click here to view some video milestones from John’s career as a driver.

KENNEWICK, WA

Steve’s hydroplane involvement began in 1980 as a crew member on The Gold Streak.  In 2002, Steve was approached at the family business, Compton Lumber, to supply materials and helped to construct an exact replica of the 1955 version of Miss Thriftway.  Between 2007 – 2018 Steve was involved co-owning and driving the boat at H1 events during the Vintage exhibition runs.

In 2022, Steve offered to help Chief Inspector John Walters with doing the safety inspection of the H1 fleet.

LAKEPORT, CA

Brian began racing inboard 280 class in 1995 and has since raced in Mod, Stock Outboard and PRO classes. He is currently APBA Region 9 Vice Chair, Northern California Outboard Associations Commodore, Assistant Referee for Region 9 and Inboard Inspector, and H1 Inspector.

Brian and wife Heidi love all extreme sports, form sand cars to NHRA drags, pleasure boating hot rods and muscle cars.

KENT, WA

Dave has been the H1 Rescue Director since 2015. He began his Rescue career volunteering with the Seafair Rescue Team in 1994, and is involved with local Region 10 limited racing rescue teams. He has designed and fabricated many capsules for driver rescue training.

Dave also crewed on boats ranging from outboards to Unlimiteds and has actually driven a vintage limited hydro – a “once in a lifetime” achievement.

GIG HARBOR, WA

Brannon has a deep background in emergency response, beginning as a US Navy Corpsman then transitioning to work as a volunteer firefighter with paramedic training. He is a certified Hyperbaric Technician and a Diver’s Alert Network DMT. 

He joined the H1 Rescue team in 2014 after spending seven years with Seafair and APBA Region 10 Rescue. Brannon is currently working as a transplant specialist, recovering human organs for transplantation.

Brannon and his family own two Sportsman Entry (SE) Starfire raceboats and have their own race team participating in the Region 10 races.

LAKE HAVASU CITY, AZ

Dave is a native of the Northwest who began watching hydroplane races in the late 1960’s. He joined Seafair as a volunteer in the 80’s and worked on several committees – Video, Gas Dock, Tower Dispatch and finally, doing course setup as a diver.

He moved into Rescue and is a rescue diver for APBA Region 10 and is currently Rescue Chairman for Seafair. As a Rescue Diver, Dave helps to extract the driver and render medical aid if needed.

PANAMA CITY BEACH, FL

Joe began volunteering as a diver for APBA Region 10 in 2017 before joining H1 in 2022. He has been a Navy Chief Deep Sea Diver and Diving Instructor for more than 20 years.

He is married to wife Brianne and has three children.

HANOVER, IN

Cathy grew up in Madison where the Regatta was a regular family event. She began working for Safety & Rescue at the Regatta 20+ years ago, then became Medical Director for the event. She was asked to join H1 as a medical professional and gladly accepted.

Cathy performs many functions at a race event, from doing daily driver physicals to providing care for almost any medical issue in the pits.

ANAHEIM, CA

Jim got hooked on hydroplanes growing up in the Seattle area in the late 1950’s and early 60’s. He became actively involved by doing pit tours in Tri-Cities and Seattle for more than 15 years. Jim is the “data man” of Unlimited hydroplane racing, having documented the sport back to its beginnings in 1904, and is the author of “Hydro’s Who’s Who”  documenting the sport’s history, and has been an assistant timer for the past 20 years.

Jim has been married to wife Teresa for over 50 years.

KENNEWICK, CA

Mary was introduced to boat racing when husband Steve Compton was crewing on the Gold Streak in the early 1980’s.  She was the “woman behind the man” during the Miss Thriftway years (2003-2018), has always loved being a fan, and thoroughly enjoys watching the races. With Steve’s involvement in H1 working with Chief Inspector John Walters, Mary wanted to participate in helping where she could. 

With Jan Shaw expanding her duties, Mary will become assistant timer with Jim Sharkey.

ROCHESTER HILLS, MI

Nick has been an avid fan of the sport since age 6 and has attended every Detroit race since 1994.  He volunteered with H1 during the 2021 season, providing onsite help with race day statistics before officially joining the H1 team in 2022.  Nick assists with results, video replay, the H1 Unlimited Live Stream, social media and troubleshooting on the officials tower.

He enjoys playing roller hockey, gaming and he and wife Rachel can be found performing classic rock with his dad and brother around the Metro-Detroit area.

LAKE TAPPS, WA

Lisa began in H1 Unlimited with husband Walt Ottenad as part of the U-13 crew in 2007. She began flying drones in 2017 and established the drone program for H1 Unlimited in 2018, eliminating the need for expensive helicopters that carried multiple referees. The program began by recording each heat of racing for later review by referees, and by 2021 the quality improved so the referees could view the drone views on monitors above each turn.

The drones also allow live views to be broadcast on our live stream from each event.

Lisa was featured with husband Walt in the December 2022 edition of the Unlimited News Journal – click here to read the article.

EDMONDS, WA

Brian has been around Unlimited hydroplanes since childhood as his father Steve Montgomery was the voice of the sport for four decades on radio, television and PA systems.

Brian’s skillful drone piloting provides live feeds to our referees and streaming coverage as well as more creative shots during testing and qualifying, when the referees don’t need to monitor the action from above. His unique perspective from the sky gives us the ability to showcase the beauty of the Unlimiteds. Brian also helps with H1 video production, graphics and social media. He features the sport on his Montwork Instagram page with over 100,000 followers.

LARGO, FL

Dan has been an integral part of the media end of H1 Unlimited since the mid-1990’s, first as a crew member that helped broadcast our races, then becoming the first person to fly FAA-authorized drones at our events to capture the beauty of our boats from the air. He has continued to push the envelope in drone coverage for all sports, most recently using drones for live broadcast coverage for ESPN at the Cheeze-It Bowl 2021-23. He owns two television Emmy awards for his camera work for ESPN in the 1997 X Games and 2016 Olympic Games for NBC.

Dan owns VideoPhotog.com and is a professional television cameraman and video technician, regularly traveling to cover various sporting events including the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.

KENNEWICK, WA

Chris has been documenting the sport since the early 2000’s and has attended almost every race event in the past two decades. His extensive collection of photos for each race are uploaded after each event and all are available to view on the H1 Unlimited SmugMug page and on Chris’ own SmugMug page.

KENNEWICK, WA

Brad has been involved in radio broadcasting of the sport since 1998, as part of KONA Radio in Tri-Cities. He began broadcasting the Seafair race in 2004 and joined the H1 staff in 2011. Brad is the voice of H1 on the PA and emcees our annual banquet.

Brad has been married to wife Debbie for 20 years. They have 5 children, 5 grandchildren and 6 great-grandchildren. Fun fact – Brad has the “Gold Cup Lounge” in his home – a hydro-themed room with TONS of hydro memorabilia.

EDMOND, OK

Tana  began volunteering in Tri-Cities in 2018, helping Brad Luce with organizing papers, listening for speeds, and doing anything she could to help.  As Media Liaison, she is the link between the H1 referees and the announcers/media during races, monitoring the radios and passing along information so the fans get accurate information as soon as possible. 

Tana has been married to husband Mike for 31 years, we have 2 children, and 5 grandchildren.

LAKE TAPPS, WA

Walt has been a fan of the Unlimiteds since the 60’s and was part of three different crews (U-13, U-37 & U-11) doing data, onboard video and media prior to joining the H1 staff in 2011. He pioneered the use of onboard GoPro cameras, and has continued to the current day mounting Go Pros on every boat during every heat.

Walt also developed and published the H1 Unlimited app and designed and built the current H1 Unlimited website.

Walt & wife Lisa were featured in the December 2022 Unlimited News Journal – click here to read the article.