Chase Clark

With Space Shuttle Endeavour safely docked to the ISS, I found myself with a free weekend down on the Space Coast. The Super Boat International’s first race of the season was being held that same weekend in Cocoa Beach. Sunny skies and hot temperatures made for a perfect day for the second annual Thunder on the Beach races.

The day before the actual races I was lucky enough to acquire media credentials for the event and even managed to get a spot on the press boat. I got taken out into the middle of the race course and photographed the opening set of races. It was an interesting time trying to properly frame a boat traveling more than 60 mph while standing in a boat that was bouncing up and down just offshore about a mile south of the Cocoa Beach Pier.

After the first event was over, the press boat headed back to Port Canaveral to pick up some more people. I went ashore and headed down to the Pier making it there just a few minutes after the afternoon set of races had begun. I photographed the boats for a few minutes from the Pier before heading down onto the beach and shooting the rest of the races from the sand and surf. It was a fun day and I even managed to get a few decent photos of the boats and the beach spectators.

These and other photos from the races are available for purchase as prints at my photography website which can be found at http://chase-clark.smugmug.com/.