The Miami Boat Show Poker Run was in full swing and YouTube channel Wavy Boats was on hand to catch all the action!
For the uninitiated I’ll start with “What is a poker run”?
- Min deposit £10. Min bonus £10, max bonus £150. 25x wagering (deposit + bonus) on selected Powerboats America Poker Run games. Bonus validity is 30 days.
- With seating for six people, the 45 Speede can hold a big crew for poker runs or a day on the water. It’s that automotive inspiration that went into the creation of the 45 Speede, a gorgeous V-bottom that made its debut at the recent Miami International Boat Show.
- Stu Jones and the Florida Powerboat Club set out on the 22nd Annual Poker Run to the Florida Keys. The spectacular event after the Miami Boat, boats leave Mi.
This sums it up, from Discover Boating:
Poker Runs America is North America premiere promoter of poker runs. Their website and magazine showcase the latest in offshore racing and high-performance powerboats, along with event listings and a rundown in all the latest racing tech.
But what if, they surmised, the long ride had several stops and at each stop participants picked up a playing card before riding to the next one—all with the goal of coming away with best five-card stud poker hand in the group? And what if the holder of that hand—or the top three holders of the top three hands—came away with some kind of prize?
Would that add to enhance the fun of the rally? The answer was a definitive yes and the popularity of motorcycle rallies with poker-run format skyrocketed. So it was only natural they would find their way into the go-fast powerboating world, and that was exactly what happened in the early 1990s when Canadian Bill Taylor founded Poker Runs America and launched a series of events. By the end of the decade, Stu Jones, another Canadian who had immigrated to the United States, founded the Florida Powerboat Club, which launched its own series of poker runs.
The Florida Powerboat Club is still thriving—as you’d guess from the name of the outfit—all of its poker runs are in the Sunshine State.
The Miami Boat Show Poker Run features all the biggest names in the performance powerboat industry. The event kicks off after the Miami International Boat Show. The boats leave from the Haulover Marine Center and head out to the Atlantic via Haulover Inlet.
For this year’s Poker Run we have 3 things that make for amazing footage, a nice chop on the water, a chopper filming chasing and filming, and serious horsepower. We won’t go through each boat here, just click on the video below and enjoy! Let us know which was your favorite!
Want to see more speed?
Check out this 1600hp Nor-tech powering through the waves
Stu Jones, leader of the Florida Powerboat Club, says he is “picking up all the pieces” following his epic Key West Poker Run that took well over 200 teams from Miami to the USA’s Southernmost city for six days of fun, sun and Race World Offshore‘s Key West Offshore World Championships. Jones also revealed his group’s 2020 schedule, which will closely mirror this year’s itinerary. (See below for the complete schedule.)
Jones said the 2019 poker run season outpaced previous years, and credited the strong economy for the growth.
“This year turned out to be really successful, in that we launched a lot of new events and we set records on some of our bigger events, like the Key West Poker Run,” he says. “I think it reflects the state of the economy being at a very high level. The sport continues to grow, just because it’s a great sport and a great way to enjoy performance boating. We’re getting more people coming into this sector, and that’s why these events have become more successful. Seeing Key West go to record numbers, and going off without a hitch, was a real highlight.”
It’s been just about a decade since Jones operated his ubiquitous pace boat, 39′ Nor-Tech King of Clubs, which was a familiar fixture on FPC’s numerous runs through the years. This year, Jones could be seen driving his Project 1080 Cigarette (showcased in the May issue of Speedboat Magazine) during nearly every one of his group’s events, which was another red-banner moment.
“We put in 150 hours on the boat from January to November,” he reports. “That was a highlight for sure. The fact that I could start enjoying these poker runs in my own boat put a different slant on it for me and made them more enjoyable. Certainly one of the reasons it made my Key West run more fun is that I was able to drive my own boat all the way there and all the way back, and I haven’t been able to do that for a long time.”
The Cigarette project boat celebrates the club’s 25th anniversary and perfectly captures the whole spirit of what the poker runs are for Jones. “It was truly special for me,” he says, “and I think it was one of the reasons I really enjoyed the 2019 Key West run.”
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Jones says that the international participation at his club’s events continues to expand, “not only from Canada, which has always been strong, but European boaters are making transatlantic crossings, putting their boats on freighters and bringing them over here for the season to enjoy,” he says. “We had about 10 teams this year from European nations—all of them had brought their boats over for this event.”
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With more participants than ever, the onus was on FPC to give away a colossal amount of shirts and other goodies. “It all goes bye-bye at Key West—we finish it off there,” he grins. “There might’ve been a few things left over. Smalls and mediums.”