National and World

Champions to Race for the

North American

Championships

during RegattaFest After successfully defending their National Championship titles, F2/SST 120 pilot Lee Daniel (SC) and F3/SST 60 driver Toby Hood (PA) are gearing up for the APBA sanctioned North American Championships in New Martinsville, West Virginia. Joining them will be the former F2 World Champion, Jeff Shepherd (Woodlawn, TN). Full fields in both classes are expected, with teams arriving from across the United States and representatives from Canada, so capturing the title won’t be easy.

Known for fast water—the New Martinsville racecourse holds more than 126 national and world speed records—the eighth annual RegattaFest is also the final opportunity this racing season for teams to add to their points standings for overall Powerboat Superleague championships.

In addition to the OPC category F2 and F3 classes, the RegattaFest race card will feature the SuperSport class, they call themselves the “outlaws,” and the Thundercat Division, rigid inflatable race craft with a two-person team. It’s a toss up on predicting these winners, but expect a strong showing from Bart Shafer (SC) and Chip Wavro (GA) in the SuperSport class and the father-daughter Yacko family team (MI) in the Thundercats.

Racing action is scheduled to start at 10 am on Saturday morning with mandatory testing sessions for all classes, followed by a full afternoon of sanctioned racing and preliminary championship heats from noon to 4 pm. Sunday, testing begins at 11 am, with the Championship finals slated to begin at 1 pm.

Make plans to join us for explosive racing action all weekend during RegattaFest, September 28-29 in downtown New Martinsville, at Fireman’s Park on the banks of the Ohio River. REGATTAFEST --it’s Fast, it’s Fun, and best of all it’s FREE.

Entrepreneurs Pitched On September 10th, the Chamber hosted the 4th annual

Entrepreneur Pitch. Six groups of entrepreneurs

presented the plans they had to and eager audience and

a panel of three judges. The Contestants were: Beeutiful

Landscaping & Design, The Farmhouse at Rising Moon

Farm, North Street Boutique, Riggenbach Woodcrafts, Sparrow Music &

Church Supplies and Stalder Family Creamery.

The presentations were diverse and everyone had a compelling idea that

would be great for the region, but when all

the votes were counted, the winners were:

1st — North Street Boutique

2nd — Stalder Family Creamery

3rd — Riggenbach Woodcraft

Thank you to all who attended and a special

thanks to each of our pitchers!

The United Way Cares On September 11th this year, the United Way

organized the 28th annual

Sandy O’Haver Day of Caring. On the Day of Caring,

the United Way does a push to find volunteers willing

to sacrifice their time to help do good by donating

their time to one of many local non-profit.

In New Martinsville, I found two volunteers from

Covestro who were helping out at the Gabriel Project.

They told me about how, not only did their company

let them take the day off from work, but also,

Covestro was paying them to volunteer. Covestro

actually offers all of it’s employees three paid

volunteer days per year.

The United Way had connected these gentlemen with

the Gabriel Project for the day. When I found them,

they had just finished unloading some heavy cribs

they had

transported

down from Wheeling. They

were planning on helping out

later by helping with switching

out the summer cloths with the

warmer winter offerings.