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James Cater Racing

~ Realising the childhood dream…

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Tag Archives: extreme

A ride in a Seabreacher

11 Tuesday Oct 2016

Posted by jamescaterracing in Uncategorized

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Tags

black sea, bulgaria, experience, extreme, fun, JetSkiBG, jump, passenger ride, seabreacher, shark, watersports

A ride in a Seabreacher

A few months ago I saw a pretty cool video doing the rounds on Facebook of some enclosed jet-ski-type thing that blasted through the water like a shark.

It was one of those things that you watch in awe, and then just forget about, as you know you’ll never actually see one in real life.

So as I strutted my blue-skinned self along the beach front of Sunny Beach, Bulgaria, I found myself doing a huge double-take as my eyes spotted this:

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I made a bee-line straight for it to get a closer look.

It’s called a Seabreacher – this model I believe is the X-spec one and the most powerful. Here are the specs as standard:

Two seat (Pilot: 6′ 4″, Passenger: 6′ 2″)

Rotax 1500cc 4 stroke engine

260 hp supercharged, intercooled

High output, low emissions

Fuel capacity: 14 gallons (52L)

Length: 17′ (5.18m)

Width: 3′ (0.9m)

Wingspan: 7’10” (1.9m)

Approximate weight: 1350lb (612.35kg)

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The deal was a 7km passenger ride for 110 Lev (about £45) – which is quite expensive in Bulgarian terms, but could I really pass up this opportunity?

Hell no!

I paid up and had to sit on the beach waiting to catch my first glimpse of the Seabreacher in action, as it headed over from another part of the coast, my heart rate already showing an excited 120bpm on my FitBit.

Now, I don’t really like the water. That said, I’ve always fancied a bit of powerboating – probably because of my racers mindset that nothing can possibly go wrong for me, so I’d never actually end up in the water.

As I saw the Seabreacher bobbing towards me, I was told to wade out into the Black Sea as the driver/pilot climbed out and pulled his seat forward to make room.

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I deftly scrambled into the cockpit and they strapped me into a 4 point harness.

Once the driver was back on board, the revs rose as he pootled out into deeper water with the canopy still open. Once there, he pulled it shut over our heads, and it was down to business.

It didn’t feel too claustrophobic to me, as it’s a big old canopy – but you are quite enclosed by the sides and the back of the pilots seat, and your legs have to go around his seat down the sides.

The whole craft vibrated as he spiked the revs up to 9000rpm, and we danced over the waves surprisingly gently. There was none fo the slap you get in boats and jet skis as it crests a wave and slams back into the water.

He swung hard right, the Seabreacher tipping right over on its side like a motorcycle or plane banking into a turn – the canopy turning a deep green as the sea covered us.

Then the sea started coming in over me! Reading the website, there is supposed to be some kind of seal that the driver inflates to seal the cockpit – but that was either broken or not used here. That meant that every time we went under the water, the water came in and absolutely soaked me! The Black Sea is very cold – but in 30 degree sunshine I wasn’t going to worry about this. You never feel like it’s going to fill up and drown you or anything – in fact I never even felt water pooling around my feet, so it must pump it out again pretty fast.

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Not that I had too much time to worry about this, as we came out of the banked turn by breaching out of the sea (hence the name – just like sharks, wales and dolphins do!), jumping out over the waves briefly before diving back in, full on the throttle.

He then killed the revs, bringing us almost to a stop, before suddenly opening the throttle fully, and the nose dipped down below the waves as we ploughed downwards into the green depths.

A few seconds passed in the green gloom before we were headed straight up, breaking through the waves at a 90 degree angle into the blue sky, even the tail fins launching clear of the water, before tilting and coming down belly first.

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Experienced drivers can get the craft airborne and do a barrel roll in mid-air, too!

It was a great and very unique experience, and a lot of fun!

However, it wasn’t as extreme as I thought it might be. that’s probably more to do with the fact I’m used to racing cars, or scraping my knees on the tarmac at 100mph+ – and I can see how it would blow most people’s minds. I think with an extra few hundred horsepower it would be an absolute beast – and I’d love to have a play around in even a standard one!

It was good seeing something I never thought I’d lay eyes on, and actually getting to experience it. If you ever see one, then do everything you can for a go, because it is worth it.

I guess I’ve already pushed the bar up so high it takes more to really get me going!

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And a short video I made from the footage:

A FitBit in a racecar!

04 Wednesday May 2016

Posted by jamescaterracing in Fitness, Formula Vee, Racing, Uncategorized

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Tags

charts, driving, extreme, fitbit, fitness, heart attack, heart rate, inches from death, peak, racing, screen shots

A FitBit in a racecar!

It’s worth saying from the start that I am not the ‘fit bit’ in the racecar.

For those who don’t know, a FitBit is a bracelet type thing that keeps track of things like heart rate, how many steps you’ve taken, how much sleep you’ve got, and any exercise you’ve done. There are a load of cheap ones on the market and the main thing missing is the heart rate monitor, but I chose he FitBit HR because it has this and works on Windows phones.

For £100, they’re very clever pieces of kit that can be use to set and track a lot of health targets, even including calories burnt and helping with a diet plan. My main interest, though, was to find out what happens to my heart when I’m racing.

For the Brands Hatch round of the 2016 Formula Vee championship, I wore my FitBit, and have taken several screenshots of the heart reading that I got from the weekend.

My normal resting heart rate is around 66bpm. Based on age (220bpm minus your age), my maximum heart rate is 181bpm.

Arriving at the circuit on Friday afternoon, it seemed like a good idea to take the racecar to get scrutineered (officials check the car and your kit are safe and within the regulations) ready for the weekend.

A ‘formula’ racecar is a bit of a beast. It has one sole purpose in life, and that is to go fast. Two – if you count “trying to kill you”. The point is that even being around one will get you going a bit.

I jumped in the car and drove about 200m up the hill in 1st gear, just to save us pushing it – and then checking the heart rate logs my pulse went up to over 120bpm just doing this!

I’d asked people on Facebook and at work what they thought my max bpm would be – and this showed that a few would be way off the mark!

The following morning was where the fun really started, and I strapped into the full 6 point harness, donned my helmet and HANS device, and rolled out onto the circuit to complete the qualifying session.

As you’ll see from the graph below, whizzing around a track got my heart pounding up to 152bpm! Perhaps unsurprisingly, this peak was early on in the session, where the fear and excitement are strong, and your brain readjusts to thraping a car around at over 100mph.

bpm20qual_zps6wvb8qcm

What is something of a surprise, is that my heart rate dropped to almost 110bpm in the middle of the session as I settled into a rhythm and got used to things, before rising to around the 150bp mark again as I gave a push to find a decent lap time.

Then came the first race of the weekend.

30 cars all trying to pile into the first rollercoaster of a corner on cold tyres is a thing to behold. Even getting to the grid and waiting for those red lights to come on is pretty stressful – your visor steams up, and your adrenaline is in overdrive.

When the red lights switch off, and you try to get the power down faster than everyone around you, you’re already in that deep calm state.

The only thing I can really compare it to is a fist fight. All the fear leading up to it lasts until you get that first punch in the face – then you’re just into the battle and you find everything slows down for you. You start to think and plan and the blinkered tunnel around you starts to open up again.

If you’re not the violent type, then the next best example I can give is all the excitement, fear and worry as you get ready to go up on stage (in a band, for me). One you play the first few notes you forget the crowd and just concentrate on playing the music…

Calm as this all may seem to you, this is when your body is working the hardest:

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Boom! 171Bpm!

As you can see, my heart rate was pretty high the whole time, but that 171 peak was undoubtedly when I lost the back end on the last lap around Surtees. To me, this was massive, and I felt the back come around, snapped on some opposite lock, and then found I was headed off the track at a very high speed. I thought it was an accident, and it would be a big one, but by luck or judgement I’d got the amount of correction on the steering wheel so exact that somehow still got it turned into the following corner.

Of course, on video, this looks like nothing. Quick twitch, carry on, no drama.

Anyway – that was the peak of the weekend.

You can see slight patterns, but I don’t think the FitBit is sensitive enough that you’ll be able to see stuff like: 156bpm around Paddock Hill, 148 at Druids etc.

I tried harder in race 2, without question.

I also had a large can of Monster energy drink about an hour before I got in the Vee.

And so this result surprised me:

bpm20r2_zps26r6rlak

Yes – that’s a peak of a mere 134! So much for energy drinks increasing your heart rate!

I find this pattern very interesting. The initial peak is that start and then the lull is waiting on the grid after the race was red-flagged.

You’ll not that on the restart, my heart rate rises, but is even lower overall, and with a big dip.

The spike will have been from a battle, and then the dip from when I was ‘in the zone’ chasing after another driver. The peak will be me catching him and pushing hard to do so.

And so what does it all mean?

I do concentrate hard on my heart rate in the gym – how to control it and lower it. It seems this kind of training is well-founded!

The 171bpm peak isn’t entirely unexpected, as we’re all doing something pretty stupid out there – and trying hard to do it, too!

We’re inches from death.

We’re also experiencing life like few others ever do.

Because of that I’m wondering if this pattern will be the same at every race? I suspect the lower heart rate in the second race is a lot to do with the body and mind getting used to being exposed to extremes. It’s more used to it, and copes better each time you do it.

There’s less fear, less excitement, and less stress. It’s like building up a tolerance to eating hot chilli’s – what you used to think was unbearably hot is now a mere tingle on your tongue.

One thing is for sure – time spent on aerobic exercise is time well spent for a racing driver!

I’ll be hoping to use my FitBit at all the races, and will post screenshots for those in the future.

Until then – don’t forget to breathe!

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