The 15th Annual Wye Island Electric Boat Marathon is a 24-mile electric boat race held in the Miles River near St. Micahels, MD. The race starts and finishes at Miles River Yacht Club and circles Wye Island. This year, the event was postponed from October 2 to October 9 due to bad weather on the 2nd. Stay tuned for a full racing recap in the December issue of PropTalk. In the Electric Boat marathon, there are five classes of racing; three for single hulls and two for multihulls. In the single hull division:
  • Class 1, Lead/Acid Batteries: Any single hull boat with a length to beam ratio less than 6 to 1, and utilizing lead/acid batteries. Entrants in this class will be handicapped by waterline length (1.34 times the square root of the waterline).  This will allow smaller boats to compete with larger ones. (note, motor/s must be rated less than 8kw)
  • Class 2, Advance Batteries: Any single hull with a length to beam ratio less that 6 to 1 and utilizing non-lead/acid batteries, or running off a fuel cell. Because of the likelihood of these boats running the entire course at planing speeds, this class will not be handicapped by waterline length.  (note, motor/s must be rated less than 8kw)
  • Class 3, Extreme Class: Any single hull boat with a length to beam ratio greater than 6 to 1, or a motor kilowatt rating greater that 8kw.   Any type of battery or fuel cell is allowed.  No handicaps.
In the Multihull division: (Any form whose intended purpose is to contribute buoyancy to the boat while it is at rest is considered a hull.  There are no handicaps in the multi hull classes.)
  • Class 4, Lead/Acid Batteries: Any boat with two or more hulls utilizing lead/acid batteries.
  • Class 5, Advanced Batteries: Any boat with two or more hulls utilizing non-lead/acid batteries, or running off a fuel cell.
2015 Course Map From race participant and PropTalk contributor Charlie Iliff:

John Todd's Yellow Flyer led a fleet of 10 around the course from Miles River Yacht Club around Wye Island and back to MRYC, The fleet had to deal with a bit of breeze out of the southeast, so some lumps in the Miles River, but there were no weather casualties. A few boats, however, including the PropTalk Electrashell managed to push too hard. The Electrashell finished, although in limp-home mode. There were a several  DNFs where competitors ran out of battery or experienced minor problems, but no major breakage. John beat the reigning record holder, Ned Farinholt in Erged On II by enough to give Ned a real challenge to find more speed for the 2016 event."

The winning boat. Photo courtesy of Tony Iliff

Photos courtesy of Jay Bliss and the Wye Island race participants. For more photos and videos from the event, click here.

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