Looking for an encouraging sign of the times? Attendance reportedly is up at the Florida Powerboat Club’s annual Miami Boat Show Poker Run which started this morning out of the Marriott Biscayne Bay and finished about an hour ago at the Holiday Isle Resort on Islamorada in the Florida Keys. According to FPC founder and owner Stu Jones, 86 boats were registered for the event. Last year’s run drew 75 boats. Of this year’s fleet, 40 percent of the boats are catamarans. According to Bob Christie, the owner of Typhoon Service Center—one of the run’s title sponsors—and the Speed Racer catamaran, 14 of those cats were from Marine Technology, Inc.

Unfortunately for Christie and the Speed Racer crew, his well-known MTI 44-footer was sidelined early in the run with calibration issues in its new 1,300-hp electronically fuel-injected, supercharged engines from Potter Performance Engines.

“What are you going to do?” Christie told me over the phone as he and throttleman Chuck Burke idled back to Grove Harbor. “Obviously, I’m very disappointed, but there’s nothing I can do about it now.”

Then Christie answered his own question. “I’ll tell you what we’re going to do,” he said. “We’re going to clean up the boat, put it on the trailer and then we’re going to drive down to Islamorada and hang out and party with everyone at the Tiki Bar. This run is all about the people who come. Of course, I want my boat to be there and I’m disappointed. But first and foremost, it’s about the people.”