Ice Boats

These are a few boats from a regatta on Lake Monona a couple weeks ago. Ice boating is an old tradition that started in Europe. It takes really special conditions (there must be wind and the lake must be mostly snow-free). These conditions last only a few days in Wisconsin and can come and go quickly. So when the ice is good, the boaters spend a couple days out there, flying around. There is a claim that the world record was set near here, on Lake Winnebago by a man named John Buckstaff, who in 1938 apparently clocked 143 mph in a 72 mph wind. I think that's really cool because there probably weren't cars that could go that fast in that day. Recently, there's been a Brit who's trying to beat the record in Montana in a boat that looks like a tweaked out kite spaceship.

I like this quote from Peter Harken about his experience on an ice boat. “We have been clocked by police radar, yes, curious cops who couldn't quite believe what they were seeing blazing across the ice. Anyway, they've read 120 mph as we bored down towards the leeward pin. It's not the speed getting to the leeward pin that makes me change my pants between every race, it's my outright fear of rounding the pin with several other boats all aiming at the same spot and no one letting up on the gas pedal - insane idiots!" It's pretty extreme...you're alone flying over the ice on skates just a couple feet above the ground, going as fast as a car? I'd love to try it out, but I'd never do it solo. I'd consider riding in a side car...likely I'll stick to my ice skates, on my feet.