Two things are almost guaranteed at the Lake of the Ozarks Shootout: American Ethanol wins the Top Gun title and rain will visit during the weekend.
True to form, American Ethanol won its tenth consecutive Top Gun on Sunday, capturing it after a record-breaking 221-mph run at the 36th annual event in Missouri. The Illinois-based team ran just once during the rain-shortened Saturday morning and with the Top Gun all but assured, the team decided to pull the 51’ Mystic catamaran to preserve the experimental engine technology.
American Ethanol has 10,000 horsepower, but one side of the quad-engine setup was making roughly 1,000 less horsepower.
“We want to go the next level, not just where we’re at,” said American Ethanol team owner Don Onken. “Once we get the two engines in, we think we can go in the 230s (mph) with two more of the quad cams in there.”
Driver Tony Battiato and throttleman John Cosker broke their previous record of 217 mph, which was set on the 3/4-mile. Onken’s team has won every Top Gun title since 2015.
While the overall speeds might not reflect it, American Ethanol had more competition than in recent years. Five boats topped 150 mph this year with Dirty Duck coming the closest challenge with a 202-mph run, despite having half the horsepower. The Skater Powerboats 438 catamaran, owned by Slug Hefner, had a friendly rivalry with American Ethanol’s Onken.
“I told Don with the American Ethanol boat you’ve got four engines and I’ve got two,” Heffner said. “You should give us a handicap. They have handicaps in golf and bowling. I don’t know why we wouldn’t do this. And he said, “Well, I’ll take two out. If you take two out.”
Myrick Coil and Rusty Williams ran the Skater to 199 mph on Saturday and went out on Sunday to break the 200-mph mark. The team switched props and got 202 mph.
“If we had today’s setup and ran it yesterday (during cooler temperature), I think we could have done better than the 202 mph without the wind conditions we had today.”
Rounding out the Top 5, Jim Schultz had a 186-mph pass in his 51’ Outerlimits and Team Yahoo’s Jamin Jones ran 170 mph.
Organizers said there was a record 111 boats and PWC participating in the 2024 Shootout. There was a week of activities leading up to the Shootout runs including a charity auction, poker run, street party and rides for Make-A-Wish children and their families. The Shootout raised a record-breaking $675,000 for local charities in 2023, and by all indications, should set another fundraising record.
“It was a great weekend. We had record-breaking events all week,” said Leah Martin, executive director of the Lake of the Ozarks Shootout. “The street party was massive, the poker run was great and the live auction raised $350,000. We couldn’t do it without the thousands of volunteer hours.”
