Saturday, August 5, 2006
Hydro fever blends nostalgia with competition for die-hards
By AMY ROLPH
P-I REPORTER
The Voice of Seafair
He's been the voice of Seafair for 40 years, a constant presence in a sport some said had too many fatalities and too few races to last.
Hydroplane announcer Pat O'Day, currently with KIRO, started his broadcasting reign in 1966, the same year three drivers were killed in a Washington, D.C., race. It's taken a long time, but O'Day says the sport, like himself, has made it through the good and the bad to secure a place in the hearts of sports fans.
O'Day, a disc jockey with KJR at the time, recalls he was in Dallas in the late 1960s with Jimi Hendrix when he got a call from a local station asking him to be the sole announcer for the hydro races.
"I said, 'I can't do seven hours by myself,' " he said.
Luckily, O'Day had friends in high places. Singer Wayne Newton owed him a favor -- O'Day was airing Newton's music long before other stations -- and he agreed to co-host the races.
"He did great," said O'Day. "Since then, some station has always picked me up, and that's how 40 years go by."
Since driver capsules and canopies have made the sport safer, O'Day said hydroplane racing has been slowly reclaiming a spot at the forefront of American sports.
"It's still a spine-tingling thrill, but we've eliminated fatality as the constant companion to the sport," said O'Day.
Hydroplane racing has been good to him over the years. He describes the sport as "just a lot of fun."
"I'm not alone -- there's a few thousand people who agree with me," he said.
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