Stormy Waters! Stormy Waters!

Celebrating thirty years of the Key West Poker Run was certainly the buzz as FPC organizers and 275 powerboat teams from around the world prepared for the club's signature poker run. Mother Nature had something else in mind, as she dealt an unwelcome visitor named Hurricane Nicole to Miami's doorstep on the poker run departure days, forcing Plan B on all fronts!

By Stu Jones

The 30th Annual Key West Poker Run was presented by Cigarette Racing Team for the second consecutive year, and enjoyed a stellar 275-boat roster of high-performance hardware from the United States, Canada and Europe. But Tropical Storm Nicole, later named a category one hurricane, forced cancellation by a significant number of these teams, many experiencing travel delays, cancelled flights, boat transporting issues and windstormexclusion clauses on their boat insurance policies.

While FPC management had high hopes of a successful outcome to ring in the 30th anniversary of this signature poker run event, the storm put the FPC team on high alert, as they monitored the Miami- bound storm track, and modified the poker run agenda to ensure safe passage of over two hundred powerboat teams, departing from three different staging points in Fort Lauderdale, North Miami Beach, and Coconut Grove. After receiving a bulletin from Miami Dade Fire Rescue and phone calls from the United States Coast Guard sector commanders, FPC president Stu Jones made the prudent decision to cancel the Wednesday run, keeping Thursday on the schedule and adding a new Friday departure from Miami. This provided a great outcome, as more than 125 teams made the run Thursday, and another thirty-plus teams departed for a smooth ride to Key West on Friday.

The Thursday run featured a variety of lunch destinations in the Upper Keys, including always popular Gilberts which hosted many of the teams, while manufacturer-sponsored lunches including NorTech Hi Performance hosting its owners at Sundowners in Key Largo, while Cigarette Racing Team returned to Sole by the Sea, at Playa Largo Resort. Mystic Powerboats returned to its favored stopover, Lazydays South in Marathon, where Mystic owners gathered for a great lunch, before taking the final 50 mile trek to Key West. For the teams requiring high-octane ethanol free fuel, Chief Marine Group in Islamorada provided the ideal stopover, where FPC fuel partner had two fuel trucks on hand to support the event.

In addition to the boaters travelling on Thursday and Friday runs, dozens of other teams took the initiative to get a jump on the storm, by boating down on Tuesday, prior to the storm's arrival, while a significant number of others decided to trailer their boats all the way from Miami to Key West, avoiding any chance of an unpleasant ride in turbulent waters. Surprisingly, the Key West agenda of events remained on schedule for the most part, with the Key West Poker Run Village opening as planned on Thursday afternoon, with land displays that included over a dozen marine trade sponsors displaying their latest powerboat models, high-performance engines, marine accessories and a wide variety of souvenir retail merchandise.

Thursday Run