This weekend was a veritable smorgasbord of delights as the much anticipated and delayed Pirates Festival and the OCRDA 2022 Aqua Adrenaline tour visited Torbay. In this article I am going to be talking a little about my two visits to the OCRDA event held last weekend at Torquay harbour as well as to show off a few images supplied by club members - once I have more I will also add these! In the meantime, you'll have to put up with a few from myself and Chris Vincenti - well done Chris.
The OCRDA, which stands for The Offshore Circuit Racing Drivers Association is run by a professional and highly experienced team of dedicated individuals. Chairman Bob McCarthy has been at the helm for many years with recent years having seen the sport grow massively in popularity with over 31 teams competing in the 2017 season. Joining up with Jetski Racing, Water Ski Racing, Zapcat Racing, Jet Ski Stunt displays, and stunning Flyboarding displays, the series has toured since 2014 as Aqua Adrenaline – combining a number of aspects to provide fantastic on water entertainment for spectators. As the sport has flourished, OCRDA have been welcoming more teams and more companies in terms of sponsorship for what promises to be another fantastic season in 2022.
The OCRDA 2022 event comes to Torbay as the first of eight heats in this seasons race calander. As always it is a hugely anticipated event both for the exciting racing it brings as well as the event in general. There’s always something interesting to see, for example Ducati were on hand to show off some of their bikes. This year, the first season after lockdown, the event was overshadowed by dull weather across the two days although Saturday did provide a little sunshine to warm the competitors and the crowd. Having been to a number of these events now over the years I have lived here in Torquay, visitor numbers were definately on the lower than average side but since the event coincided with the Brixham Pirate Festival perhaps that’s to be expected. Even so, it’s well worth planning your stay in Torquay to coincide with the event.
The racing normally starts at around 13:00 each day as there’s a lot of preparation and safety work to get through and this generally takes up the morning. Over a couple of hours in the afternoon, there are generally four races, two of which are jet-skiers and two are for the powerboats. Both offer exhilarating spectacles as the various contestants via for prime position during the race. The course itself is probably a good couple of miles from start to finish so the boats and jet skiers tend to get strung out over the 20 minutes or so of the race but if you are lucky, you often get some great shots as the head towards the bouy closest to the sea wall on Beacon Quay en masse. This is a tight LH turn as the boats race in towards the quay and often you will get three or four boats jockying for position as they hit (metaphorically speaking) the bouy for this turn. Given that the spectators are just 75 metres or so from this bouy as you can imagine, it can be quite a spectacle.
If anyone is interested, I have added a bit more detail on the gear I used plus some comments on the post processing of my particular images over on my blog at http://thecreativecamera.co.uk/ocrda-aqua-adrenaline-power-boat-tour-visits-torbay
