Young Black Diamond driver continues family boating and racing tradition

Brian Perkins grew up on Lake Sawyer with parents who had always been involved with hydroplane racing, so it’s no surprise he now drives an unlimited boat.

“You can watch it on TV, you can see pictures,” Perkins said. “But it really doesn’t do it any justice unless you can see it in person. Just the spectacle of them running – there’s nothing else like it in the world.”

He was on the water Saturday and Sunday during the Chevrolet Cup at Seafair on south Lake Washington in Seattle. This is the summer festival’s 60th year and the race is the culmination of the month-long Seafair celebration.

Perkins, 24, explained both his grandfathers were “involved in boat racing one way or another” and, as a result, so were his parents. His parents, Kevin and Laurie, volunteered at the races at Seafair, starting as teenagers and tackling every job under the sun.

Even after he and his sister, Kayleigh, came along his parents remained involved.

“Kayleigh and I haven’t missed a Seafair ever,” he said. “Kayleigh was born in June and she was taken down there in August. We grew up around it.”

At 15, Perkins got his first boat, which was built in 1977.

“I got the racing bug first and so dad and I got a little boat,” he said. “We were crewing on an unlimited at the time, also.”

His first boat, powered by a 1977 Honda Civic engine, was a 1-liter, the smallest inboard category run in Region 10 that covers Washington state. Perkins said they still campaign a 1-liter boat and at times have run as many as three.

“I still have the boat and I race it from time to time,” he said. “The older boats, they’re made out of wood. And it’s much smaller … and much more fragile.”

Plus it has an outdated engine. His first boat doesn’t see as much time on the water as it used to.

As a teenager, Perkins became enamored with boat racing, and he said it can take up as much time as you let it “but the success you achieve comes from what you put into it.

“Anytime I wasn’t at school or doing anything else I was working on a boat or cleaning a boat or around them,” he said. “It’s still that way now.”

He works for the family business, Perkins Glass, in Seattle. The business gives him and his sister, who drives an unlimited light hydroplane, the freedom to take time off during the 12-race season.

There are a number of different categories of inboard hydroplane boats. They range from the small 1-liter boats Perkins started out in to the unlimited boats he now races. The unlimited and unlimited light categories are the biggest and most powerful, as well as the premier categories.

The boat he runs, the Miss Lakeside Paving sponsored by Albert Lee, has an engine that came out of a Vietnam era Chinook twin rotor helicopter. It measures 30 feet, generates 3,000 horsepower, weighs about 8,000 pounds and runs on jet fuel.

Each weekend they run four heats, two on Saturday and two on Sunday, with each day considered its own race. Sometimes, Perkins said, points from all four heats will be combined to determine a winner. At other events Sunday’s final heat will be winner-take-all. The points accumulated also go toward the national championship.

Like NASCAR drivers, Perkins wears a fire suit that breathes pretty well, to protect him in case of a flare up on the boat. In the cockpit there are a pair of large red buttons that say, “Fire Push” that run to fire extinguishers all over the boat.

When Perkins is not working, he spends his free time either repairing or rebuilding boats, or he is working on his annual capsule training in a pool to keep his cockpit safety skills sharp.

“Being in the boats, they’re very confined,” he said. “The visibility is confined. You’re completely closed off in an F-16 fighter canopy kind of deal. It’s a safety cell. That’s what we call it. It has a roll cage in it. They’re not water-tight or air-tight, so, if the thing does go upside down, it can fill with water.”

Hence the training in a pool as the drivers are equipped with air masks that are attached to scuba tanks so they breathe underwater if necessary.

In the summer, racing is a full time job for Perkins, and he wouldn’t have it any other way especially as Seafair approaches.

“This is our biggest race, other than the APBA Gold Cup in Detroit,” he said. “Being that Seafair is celebrating its 60th year, it’s a pretty substantial race for anyone who is based here. I am racing against my heroes that I admired growing up and still admire. It’s unbelievable. It’s a dream come true, to be honest.”

Reach Kris Hill at khill@maplevalleyreporter.com or 425-432-1209 ext. 5054. To comment on this story go to www.courierherald.com or www.blscourierherald.com.