RocketShips

Half a dozen times a year, Mike Kitagawa, a Woodland Hills resident, climbs into the cockpit of a 2,200-horsepower speedboat, then rips across a quarter-mile strip of water in 6.5 seconds.

At 50, Kitagawa is one of speedboat racing’s oldest drivers, having competedin 450 races since 1973.

He says he has no plans to slow down: “I like the acceleration. I like the speed.”

Kiagawa races blown-gas hydroplanes,the dragster of the waters. Currently, he is a member of the Chatsworth-based Sha-Boom racing team.

The team, says Sha-Boom crew chief Roland “Captain” Russ, is named after the noise you make when you fall off your bar stool.”

Kitagawa’s father, a drag racer, introduced him to the high-octane world of steel and rubberwhen he was a young boy. While in high school, Kitagawa fixed cars and raced them on Los Angeles streets.

Now, Kitagawa says, he prefers drag boats because they are cheaper to maintain and easier to fix than their landlocked cousins.

The Sha-Boom is barely a boat-only a few inches of the hull actually touch he water as it torpedoes toward the finish line. A tunnel carved into its underside catches enough air to lift the boat up on sponsons, the propeller spinning at 16,000 rpm.

The less boat in the water, Kitagawa said, the less friction to slow it down.

The result is a water-borne rocked that accelerates from 0 to 142 mph in less than 4 seconds and reaches a top speed of 184 mph.

Blown gas-boat racing is very much like drag racing, Kitagawa said. Each race starts with a countdown that launches two boats, rocketing side by side to the finish line.

“The first thing you notice when you start it up is the noise of the engine,” Kitagawa said. “Then you accelerate, it shoves you back into your seat and everything starts going past you--fast.”