American Mike Harker suffered a massive stroke and passed away April 8th in St Martin, French West Indies. Mike in his mid-60s wa about to sail from the Caribbean to the Mediterranean.

Jeff Barrus has published a snippet of footage of the 2008 Catalina DVD which is scheduled for release on 15 Feb.

Who’s voice was on the video and when?

Ski racing’s moviemaker Jeff Barrus has just released a promo video for the forthcoming 2008 Catalina DVD which you can watch below.

The 60th Annual Catalina Ski Race 2008 DVD Promo from Jeff Barrus on Vimeo.

Jeff writes …

The 60th was another amazing year for the Catalina Ski Race. It felt like a four day event this year. The Long Beach Sea Festival introduced the Powerfest Weekend Thursday Night Thunder Party on Pine St. All ages could come get up close with high performance water craft, see an extreme wakeboarding show, have a live band, and more…..Then Friday Special Needs Kids day at Marine Stadium hit record numbers for another year in a row. Saturday’s Water Ski Race brought 26 international competitors over for the challenge. Sundays Offshore Race hit speed of over 160 MPH. Then some crazies raced to Catalina and back on PWC’s Long Beach is the place to be for extreme water sports in July. Special thanks to Camino Real Chevrolet and GT Performance Marine for all their support.

22 July

I spent my time on Catalina race day directing and commentating with a TV cameraman and pilot in a chopper so I was unable to take my own footage to post online. But the footage we took from the air will I’m sure be amazing.

After years of Randy Jarrell doing a superb job of managing the Catalina Water Ski Race, a new guy now steps up to the mark – Ken Vaughan.

Long Beach Boat & Ski Club Commodore Ken Vaughan dropped me a mail yesterday to say that Dan Stiel has uploaded a great selection of vintage Catalina Water Ski Race videos to YouTube. This is a great look back to pre-2000 Catalina and I’ve included 4 x 1983 movies below. For more, simply click here to all that Dan has uploaded. Also see “Related Videos” on the right side of each video page for many more.

Long Beach Press Telegram reported on the 60th Catalina Water Ski Race featuring the shot below of Ski Racing’s Captain America, aka Jeff Barrus. He also appeared on LA’s Channel 5 news in “Photo of The Day”.

Jeff Barrus came across 18 minutes of video footage that someone took whilst perched on top of Catalina island last weekend.

Daren Van Ryte took a heap of photos at the 60th Catalina and you can see them all at the web sites listed below.

Thanks to Cindy Pryor, below are the official results of the 60th Catalina Water Ski Race. The Excel spreadsheet consists of Overall and Class results.

Catalina Standings 2008.xls

Todd Haig has just notched up his 8th Catalina win and Kim Lumley also adds another to her string of wins bringing the total to 6, as both of them put in superb performances on some tough ocean water this morning.

Peter Proctor set the pace at the start of the race with Todd Haig just a ski line behind. As they approached the island, Haig powered ahead and Randy Davis got the beautiful Nordic round the Catalina turn just ahead of Mike Avila’s Warpath towing Peter Proctor.

The two teams put up a spectacular race back to Long Beach with Haig’s & Proctor’s crews waving to their skiers as they race with just a few ski line length between them at any one time. But it was Haig who won his 8th Catalina and Proctor took a very close 2nd position, repeating their last year’s positions. Wayne Mawer took 3rd position.

Kim Lumley won the Women’s. Katelin Wendt was 2nd and Ann Proctor 3rd.

I haven’t received the results but keep checking www.catalinaskirace.net

I want to thank Jeff Barrus for arranging my ride in a chopper and a true professional team who were Johnny the pilot and Jamie the cameraman. The footage we took along with footage from another chopper, plane, boat-cams, skier-cams and beach camera will make for the best Catalina DVD ever.

Todd Haig after his 8th Catalina win from Robbie Llewellyn on Vimeo.

Kim Lumley after her 6th Catalina win from Robbie Llewellyn on Vimeo.

If you can pick up the following Californian TV channels, the footage we took will be shown today on:
Channel 2 : 3pm
Channel 7 : 5 & 6pm
Channel 5 : 10pm news
Channel 4 : Don’t know time
Channel 11 : 10pm
Times shown are local Los Angeles times

Unofficial TURN & FINISH positions (uncorrected) are shown below.

Official results here

Official results here

It’s busy here at Long Beach as teams rush around getting ready and boats pour into the water alongside the  Coast Hotel. The fog is pretty heavy right now at 8am with a light drizzle. Small boats will start at around 8.53am and all other boats will start about 7 mins later. I willupdate this post after the race.

If you can pick up the following Californian TV channels, you can see footage of the race as follows:

Channel 2 : 3pm

Channel 7 : 5 & 6pm

Channel 5 : 10pm news

Channel 4 : Don’t know time

Channel 11 : 10pm

Times shown are local Los Angeles times

With entries still coming in, it’s expected that over 70 teams will be screaming towards Catalina island tomorrow morning as we approach the 60th Catalina Water Ski Race.

The 60th Catalina is just days away and it could be a smart call to check out the official Rules & Regulations posted on www.catalinaskirace.net or directly at this link.

I caught up with former two time Catalina winner Carlo Cassa of Italy about the big event and here’s the video:

The 60th Catalina Water Ski Race is just around the corner and some of the best teams in the world are preparing for the event that has drawn skiers from all over the world for decades.

This year’s honorary starter of the Catalina Water Ski Race began helping to organize ski races in 1970. He was the race director for the Anacapa ski race (from Oxnard to Anacapa Island and back).

Update – April 17:
I have been told that you can make reservations for The Coast Hotel for the Catalina ski race weekend.

Thank you,
Ken Vaughan  -  Commodore Long Beach Boat and Ski Club
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With the high profile 60th Catalina Water Ski Race fast approaching, I thought it would be good to share a couple of interesting Catalina snippets of information. Thanks to Ted Hoffman who helped put this together.

Ted Hoffman has just sent me the line up for the 1980 Catalina with yours truly listed as a Junior Boy. The British Water Ski Federation sent an official team to the 32nd Catalina Water Ski Race which was made up of: