MOTOR RACING : Copeland May Opt to Drive in Powerboat Race After All

Al Copeland won five consecutive national superboat championships from 1984 to 1988 but didn’t race last year because of a commitment he made to his money-lenders. Copeland is the founder of the 750-unit Popeye’s and Church’s fried-chicken chains.

But the thought of missing another race season is weighing on his mind.

The Offshore Professional Tour, an organization newly founded by Copeland, actor Don Johnson and a handful of other high-profile ocean racers, will hold the second race of its inaugural season Saturday off Long Beach--and Copeland may be at the helm of his 50-foot superboat.

“If I don’t drive it, Chuck Norris will be at the helm, but when Saturday morning comes and I have to make the decision, I just might climb in myself,” Copeland said. “It just about killed me to sit on the sidelines last year.”

Copeland, Johnson and the others, including 1989 national superboat champion Charlie Marks, got together last December to break away from the American Power Boat Assn. and form OPT.

The situation is analogous to CART (Championship Auto Racing Teams) breaking away from the United States Auto Club with Indy race cars.

The OPT held its first race last Saturday in San Francisco and found the churning waters around the Bay Bridge tough on equipment. Only one superboat, INXS (In Excess), a 47-foot Apache driven by John Gehret of Wayne, Pa., finished the 157-mile race.

Johnson led the first lap before the torque from his four 980-horsepower Chevrolet engines twisted the driveshaft into knots. Marks then took the lead and posted the day’s fastest lap of 95.62 m.p.h. before his engine expired.

“We’re not used to having those big swells running right at us, like they did coming in from the ocean in San Francisco,” Marks said. “In the Atlantic, the conditions are quite different, but things should be calmer in Long Beach.”

The Queen Mary/OPT race will be 154 miles--nine laps around a seven-mile course with the start-finish line off the Belmont Pier. The fleet of about 40 boats will take off at 1 p.m. and head north along the shoreline before swinging left in front of the Queen Mary.

Then the course turns out to sea for a one-mile stretch before doubling back toward the shore and passing in front of the pier.

“The lead boats should be lapping every 12 minutes, so there’ll be something for the spectators to keep an eye on,” Copeland said.

Most of the action is expected to be in full view of the beach and bluffs from Belmont Shores to the Queen Mary.

“Our idea is to bring offshore racing closer in, so the public can enjoy the acrobatics of the boats with the ocean, but still run enough in heavy water to maintain the integrity of the event,” Johnson said.

Marks, who founded a data processing company in Baltimore, Md., won the first superboat race he entered, in September 1988, and came back the next year to win 11 of 13 races and the national APBA championship.

“No one had any idea who I was when I showed up for that first race in Atlantic City,” Marks said. “I had bought an ugly boat that was green, red, yellow, blue and white, and the first thing I did was paint it all white.

“Then I told everyone I was going to win the race. They thought I was insane, but I knew the boat was fast, even if it was ugly.”

When Marks won the national title last year, he became the first black to win a major motorsports championship--in a sport dominated by well-to-do whites. This twist is not lost on Marks.

“That boat is like a beautiful vanilla cake, and I’m the chocolate icing,” he said after winning the title and being named to the APBA Hall of Fame.

Marks is a strong supporter of OPT and its concept of taking offshore racing into major markets.

“I was the APBA national champion, but I never raced west of the Mississippi,” Marks said. “This year, I want to win again because if I do, then I will feel like I’m truly the national champion.

“But no matter how the season turns out, I want to applaud the work of Don (Johnson) in putting this whole thing together. The other guys helped out, but it was Don whose enthusiasm was contagious.”

Mark Taggart, another East Coast entry, will sponsor 100 at-risk children from the Big Brother/Big Sister program at the race. The New Jersey driver, who overcame an addiction to crack cocaine after seeing his brother and brother-in-law die of cocaine overdose, will be driving a 30-foot catamaran, Team On It/Race Against Drugs.

STOCK CARS--Saugus Speedway will holds its first chain race Saturday night after its regular program of NASCAR sportsman, hobby stock and Figure 8s. . . . Open-wheeled Grand American modifieds will make their debut Saturday night at Cajon Speedway along with the regular program of sportsman, street and bomber stocks. . . . Street stocks will race Friday night at Ventura Raceway.

NASCAR pro stocks open their final campaign at Ascot Park Sunday night with Marcus Mallett once again challenging track champions Ron Meyer and Fred Estrada in the Winston Racing Series. Last year, Mallett lost by only four points to Meyer, who also won the bomber class in a rare double championship. . . . Orange Show Speedway will introduce a new lady bomber division Saturday night in San Bernardino.

MIDGETS--Despite a cartwheeling crash last week, western regional points leader Sleepy Tripp will be back Saturday night when the United States Auto Club full midgets run in the ESPN Thunder Series at Ascot Park. Three-quarter midgets will run on the quarter-mile oval.

MOTOCROSS--The Continental Motosports Club will hold the first of 39 consecutive weekly racing programs Friday night at Ascot Park. It will be the 20th and last season for CMC racing on the Ascot obstacle course, as the track is closing in November.

SPRINT CARS--California Racing Assn. drivers and cars will be at Silver Dollar Speedway in Chico Friday and Saturday nights. . . . Winged sprint cars will race Saturday night at Imperial Raceway, near El Centro. It will be the first time winged cars have ever competed on the California Mid-Winter Fair track.

MISCELLANY--Top Gas West 90 will be at Bakersfield Raceway Saturday. . . . Formula One Grand Prix bikes of the American Road Racing Assn. will compete Sunday in Round 5 of their Willow Springs Raceway season. . . . Also this weekend, Willow Springs will play host to the opening of the Southern California Karters season.