The Unlimited hydroplanes had a rollicking wind-up to their 2003 season September 19th to 21st at the Washington Mutual Bill Muncey Cup race on beautiful Mission Bay at San Diego.
It was also one of the strangest races in memory. Nine boats were in attendance but by race time, only six were left running.

Friday's time trials were highlighted by two of the major contenders sidelined. The U-8 LLumar Window Film, with Nate Brown subbing for injured Mark Evans, twisted a prop shaft at about 150 mph, causing major hull damage to the rear of the hull.
The U-6 Oh Boy! Oberto/Miss Madison and driver Steve David suffered a similar fate, losing a prop which tore up the bottom aft section. Neither driver was injured, but hull damage was sufficient enough for both teams to withdraw for the weekend.
The next morning, Dr. Ken Muscatel was tooling down the backstretch in his Mister Home Loan  U-25, testing at a good clip when the big, black hull lifted off the water and did a 360 flip, landing  right-side up and gliding to a halt. Ken wasn't hurt, but the canopy was jammed shut from the force of his landing. The U-25 was towed back to the pits and Ken slipped out the escape hatch as the boat was lifted off the water.
With only six boats left running, the race committee were adamant against three boat heats. It was decided after the drivers' meeting to run four boats in each heat and, in round-robin fashion, allow two boats to run twice in each. That way, all boats would get to run four times in three heats of three laps each.
Sounds weird, but it worked!
In another pre-race development, LLumar Window Films decided to sponsor Ed Cooper's Gold Cup champion U-3 driven by Mitch Evans. Oberto also lent their name to the only piston powered boat, so the U-3 entered the Bill Muncey Cup race as "LLumar Window Film/Oberto/Vacationville.com".
Heat 1-A kicked off the show on Saturday with Mitch Evans in the "new" LLumar up against Mike Hanson in the U-9 Sun Harbor Mortgage (the defending San Diego champ), U-l Miss Budweiser with Dave Villwock heading for their sixth straight national championship, and rookie JW Myers in Fred Leland's U-lOO VONS American Pride.
U-3 LLumar took off at the start with Sun Harbor trailing.
VONS fell back at the start and was never a threat. Miss Budweiser, starting from the outside lane, never got close as Mitch Evans reeled off a 149.685 mph fIrst lap on the 2-1/2 mile course.

Evans won at a three-lap average of 144.146 over Sun Harbor, Budweiser and VONS followed.

Mitch then reeled off a second, a fourth, and a third in the remaining preliminary heats to advance to the six-boat Final Heat in the catbird seat.

All six boats made it out for the Final, and with no lane assignments. For the first time all day, the drivers could jockey for position.
Terry Troxell in the Trendwest crept along the buoy line all through the five minute starting period. His strategy was to get the inside, an advantage he figured was his best chance of winning. As the six crossed the start, it was announced that everyone except JW Myers would have to do an extra lap. Did they all jump? It was a moot point, since the penalties were rescinded during the running of the race. Trendwest took off with the lead on the inside with U3 LLumar chasing. Bud and Mike Weber in Miss EMCOR followed, but Sun Harbor began to lose speed crossing the line. VONS slowed in the first turn and eventually stopped. The crowds on shore went wild as Mitch Evans passed Troxell's orange and blue charger on lap 2 and began to open a big lead in his Allison-powered superboat.
Villwock caught and passed Troxell on lap 4. U-3, U-l and U-2 all lapped the U-9.
The finish was roundly cheered and applauded by the huge San Diego crowd. Mitch Evans and Ed Cooper's U-3 team had won their third race of the season - more than any other boat - and with the only Allison engine left in a sport dominated by turbines since 1986.

In fact, 1986 was also the last time an Allison engined boat won in San Diego, when Ron Armstrong took the race in Bob Patterson's Miss Bahia. The last time a piston-engined boat won here was 1988 when George Woods, Jr. did the trick in Jim Harvey's RollsMerlin powered Oh Boy! Oberto.

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