A weekend full of great weather and great light made for another great weekend home in Phoenix shooting the IHBA Napa Auto Parts World Finals at Firebird Lake. Mark motivated a few photographer friends, Will Lester and
Richard Quattrocchi to come out and shoot the boat races with me and I'm glad they did. As IHBA wraps up its last season sponsoring the drag boat series, everyone put on an exciting race.
Friday was a rough day for me. I begin setting up my gear, and my camera and lens were not talking to each other; it would not focus. FML. Luckily Richard let me borrow his D3 while he used my D300 with his 200mm. It was working great, until the battery grip it decided it did not want to work. So after the Top Fuel Hydro boats wrapped up, I made my way to Tempe Camera to rent a camera. Shortly after, I received a called from Mark that I had missed pro eliminator driver Quinton Kight crashing.
Saturday morning, I had everything working and I made way out to Firebird Raceway.
Top fuel hydro driver Glen Wilson during qualifying.

Top fuel hydro driver Daryl "Madd Maxx" Erlich deploys his chute during qualifying.

Top fuel hydro driver Jon Haas during qualifying.

IHBA top alcohol flat bottom drivers sit on the holding rope during qualifying for the Napa Auto Parts World Finals at Firebird Lake.

As each pair of boats launch off the starting line, I watch both the boats, then I pick a boat to follow and go back and forth.
Here is top alcohol hydro driver Joel Weber and Kebin Kinsley.

As I begin to follow Joel Weber, it didn't turn out the way he had hoped.








Here is my whole sequence.
GREAT shots. Sorry about the gear issues. Sounds like it is about time to order a couple of D3s bodies so they will be in before the Olympics and the rest of your schedule!
ReplyDeleteKeep up the GREAT work!
Great shots with the deploying parachutes, very dynamic.
ReplyDeleteI enjoy the 'behind the scenes' shots most personally; your water taxi, environs, etc!
Thanks for the updates!