Hydro Legend Returning To Lake CdA

Hydro team owner Billy Schumacher talks with team members after a test run of his hydroplane during the Columbia Cup in Kennewick, Washington on Friday, July 27. (SR photo: Kathy Plonka)

When the thunderboats return to Lake Coeur d’Alene this summer, a champion of the sport’s piston-powered era will be back on the water, if not actually in the driver’s seat. Billy Schumacher, of Seattle, won an impressive string of Unlimited Class hydroplane races in the 1960s and ’70s and claimed back-to-back national championships. Now 70, he’s on the race circuit again as a team owner with wife Jane. Their boat, Miss Beacon Plumbing, is headed to Coeur d’Alene for the long-awaited return of the Diamond Cup races over Labor Day weekend. It will be something of a homecoming for Schumacher: He’s the reigning Diamond Cup champion/ Scott Maben , SR. More here.

Question: When and where did you last see a hydroplane race?