Reigning South African Formula 1 powerboat champion Keagan Frankiewicz came, saw and conquered at the opening round of the new powerboat racing season held on the Vaal River at the magnificent “The View on Vaal Resort” at Abrahamsrust. In a new racing format the drivers took part in a 20 lap sprint race on Saturday followed by the traditional three by 15 lap heats on Sunday where Frankiewicz dominated from the moment racing got underway. In the Saturday sprint race he lapped everyone up to third place with Wynand de Jager and Morne Herholdt rounding out the podium.

Sundays racing action saw Frankiewicz in his Italian built Baba hull putting a stunning display of aggressive driving pushing his boat to the limit, taking three out of three wins from Michael Wessels in second with Wynand de Jager in third. A much improved performance from Michael Wessels in his Caudwell Marine Hull, which was built locally by Hi-Tech Automotive on the outskirts of Gqbergha, saw him running a lot closer to the lead boat as the weekend progressed with de Jager also improving his lap times during each heat.

Due to the problem of spare parts for the Mercury 2-litre motor becoming increasingly difficult to source internationally, five of the current drivers have already made the switch to running the 2.5-litre engine as used in the H2O World F1 Championship. As more and more drivers make the change and get used to the different set-up and propeller choices it promises to be an exciting season with races being scheduled around the country once again. Unfortunately it was a weekend to forget for Western Cape based driver Morne Herholdt who damaged the block on his 2.5-litre motor in practice on Friday and had to resort to running a 2 litre motor in its place and Bruce Repsold was plagued by an intermittent electrical gremlin that hampered his performance throughout the weekend.    

The overall combined results for the weekend were as follows –