For teams as well as most event organizers and prducers, offshore powerboat racing is anything but a profit center, and nowhere is that more true than in the Offshore Powerboat Association’s Extreme class—or Unlimited class under the Super Boat International umbrella. But there is significant money on the line between the Extreme-class Wake Effects and Miss GEICO teams at today’s OPA Lake Race on the Lake of the Ozarks in Central Missouri.

More than bragging rights are on the line today at the OPA Lake Race for the local-favorite Wake Effects team. Photos from the SBI Cocoa Beach season-opener courtesy/copyright Pete Boden/Shoot 2 Thrill Pix.

It’s not the dollar amount that makes the money matter. It’s the cause. Today’s runner-up in the Wake Effects versus Miss GEICO contest will have to donate $1,000 to the Children’s Cancer Research Fund in honor of Reese Werner, a five-year-old in the Lake of the Ozarks area whose life was cut short by the disease.

The ongoing wager tradition between the two teams started at the SBI season-opener in Cocoa Beach, Fla., where Wake Effects team owner Rusty Rahm and Miss GEICO partner Gary Goodell bet on the outcome of their rough-water battle, with the “loser” donating $500 to the winner’s charity of choice. (For the record, Wake Effects won and Miss GEICO paid up.)

The Miss GEICO team will do everything possible to keep one of its owners from having to write another check to a Wake Effects-chosen charity.

“James (Sheppard) and Steve (Curtis) are fierce competitors but I have tremendous confidence in our throttleman Jeff Harris and our crew’s preparation,” said Rahm, who drives the team’s 48-foot MTI catamaran. “It will be nice to see Gary Goodell write another check for a good cause.”

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