Highlights From The Kort 200–3.0, Part One
Because the Tickfaw 200 Poker Run hosted by Blood River Landing in Springfield was cancelled the last couple of years, speedonthewater.com chief photographer Pete Boden hasn’t returned to Louisiana to shoot pictures since 2019—the last time I was there as well. So, when the event was again cancelled in 2022 for various reasons and I got together with local performance boaters Nate Michel and Kort Wittich to help promote the third Kort 200, a low-key gathering of friends that took place in 2020 and 2021 during what would have been the Tickfaw 200 weekend, Boden and I talked about traveling to cover this year’s festivities in the Bayou.
One of the primary organizers of the Kort 200–3.0, Louisiana’s Kort Wittich enjoyed the fun run on Friday in his 38-foot Skater catamaran. Photos by Pete Boden/Shoot 2 Thrill Pix
Fortunately he made it out there this week; I did not. That doesn’t mean the stories will stop—because of family obligations, I don’t travel to most events I cover—it just means Boden and I don’t get to share a beer over a local crawfish boil or another one over at Tin Lizzy’s Landin’ or Sun Buns. It also means I probably missed out on a cool boat ride or two.
The good news is that I get to share some of Boden’s images from yesterday, which he shot as the dozens of boats in attendance headed toward Tin Lizzy’s on the Tickfaw River. Along with several sportboats from the likes of Baja, Fountain, Scarab, Velocity and more, there was some serious high-performance hardware on the water, including a wide variety of luxury performance center consoles such as P.G. and Billy Georgiou’s 50-foot MTI (click the link to read about it) and catamarans such as Wittich’s radical Skater Powerboats 388, Michel’s gorgeous 40-foot MTI Cloud IX, Burton and Yvette Kirsten’s 46-foot Outerlimits Jet, and Kim and Tina Smith’s Skater 438 GForce.
One of the stunning catamarans in the Kort 200–3.0 fleet was Mike and Angela Goldbaugh’s Skater 368, which is dubbed Late Fee$ X2. The Alabama-based performance boaters didn’t just get to run their 36-footer in the Kort 200, they got to enjoy their newly constructed camp, which they own with Wittich, for the first time. And they were thrilled.
“We are both enjoying the new place here; the pool is the best part after returning from the hot days on the water,” Mike Goldbaugh said on Saturday morning before heading back on the water. “(Kort and I) both bought F450s from RP Elite Motors & Marine and had them delivered on Tuesday. A white one for Angela and I, and a blue one for Kort. It was a lot of work but we finished the camp and had a large group here last night to kick it off. The turnout for a ‘non event’ is amazing and it’s great to have all of our friends in town helping the community.”
Check out the slideshow above for more images from the Kort 200–3.0 Friday run.
Tennessee’s Mark and Britney Godsey, who are good friends with the Goldbaughs, had a great time running their MTI 390X Project Mayhem, which is powered by twin Mercury Racing 450R engines, with some of their favorite people.
“What a great group—the whole event is great,” Mark Godsey said. “The boat ran well. We did lots of running Thursday and Friday.”
First-time visitors to the Louisiana Bayou with their canopied Outerlimits that is powered by twin Mercury Racing 1550/1350 engines, the Kirstens have been enjoying themselves.
“We’re having a blast,” Burton Kirsten wrote in a text. “This place is so damn kool.”
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