Outerlimits Debuts New Raceboat To Kick Off Factory Fun Run

With 30-plus customers and their guests in Bristol, R.I., for this weekend’s Outerlimits Offshore Powerboats Factory Fun Run, the company used tonight’s welcome party to debut its new 39-foot raceboat. But it’s not a V-bottom—it’s a canopied catamaran that will be powered by a pair of naturally aspirated 750-hp Factory Billet engines currently being built by Mike Faucher at its facility in Lake Zurich, Ill.

At the end of this weekend in Bristol, this 39-foot Outerlimits catamaran will be transported to Orlando for installation and rigging of its Factory Billet engines.

Outerlimits is going Supercat-class racing with this 39-footer to be manned by longtime customers Vinnie Diorio and Simon Prevost (click image to enlarge).

A longtime Outerlimits customer, Vinnie Diorio will throttle the boat. Simon Prevost, another loyal Outerlimits client, will drive.

Diorio currently runs Marker 17 Marine raceboat—a 29-foot Outerlimits V-bottom powered by a single Factory Billet engine—that competes in the Super Vee Extreme class on the American Power Boat Association Offshore Championship Series—with Brian Forehand. He plans to finish the APBA series with Forehand at the final race of the season, Roar Offshore (Oct. 10-12) in Fort Myers Beach, as well as run the Outerlimits catamaran in the Supercat class.

“We want to have it ready for the Fort Myers race, then the Race World Offshore races in Key West, then the Offshore Powerboat Association Offshore World Championships in Englewood Beach,” said Diorio. “We have to do everything to get as much seat time as we can.

“Brian and I are on good terms—I just had an opportunity to move up to a bigger boat,” he continued. “If I didn’t have this opportunity, I would continue to race with Brian.”

Factory Billet currently is building four engines for the new catamaran. When they are complete, they will be shipped to veteran offshore racer and rigger Steve Curtis, the owner of Offshore Marine Services in Orlando, for installation and rigging.

“We already have a lot of the parts and we’ve been making some of the things we need, like dashboards,” said Curtis. “Depending on how it all comes together, it should take about a month.”

Check out the slideshow above for more images of the new Outerlimits raceboat.

The boat was wrapped at Outerlimits. After this weekend’s event, it will be hauled to domestic Curtis’ home base in Orlando.

Outerlimits sales manager Dan Kleitz said he believes that the company’s offshore racing involvement will deliver marketing benefits for its catamaran program.

“Obviously, we are at the top of our game with V-bottoms, but we also build catamarans and the catamaran market is very important to us,” he said. “Our 46-foot cat runs unbelievably well, and we’re coming out with a new 35-foot outboard cat. Our goal is that by proving ourselves on the racecourse we will prove that Outerlimits is a major contender in the catamaran market.”

Outerlimits Debuts New Raceboat To Kick Off Factory Fun Run

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