Squandering time—something I don’t often do—in the vast and vapid land of social media yesterday, I came across a Facebook video of Leah Martin. Martin, the executive director of the Lake of the Ozarks Shootout and a board member of the World Powerboat Racing Association took the time out her day to address a rumor that she had resigned from the first-year race-sanction organization.
If Martin had stepped down—and she confirmed via text message that she had not—it was news to her. She made the opposite high-def clear in her pointed video message to the social media masses.
How do these rumors start? Simple, people with less than-noble-intentions start them. It’s not complicated. Rumors don’t generate themselves.
On one hand, attacking rumors head on and dispelling them is proactive and admirable. Sunlight truly is the best disinfectant. On the other hand, it give the cretins who start them the satisfaction of provoking a reaction. The value proposition between addressing and ignoring rumors is tricky. There’s no correct, one-size-fits all solution.
Offshore racing’s rumor mill has existed since the sport began, but this season it is has become particularly virulent, transparently motivated and bottom-dweller stupid.
How stupid? Someone who knew better told me he had heard that the Super Stock class wasn’t participating in the Race World Offshore Key West World Championships.
“We’ll have 15 and maybe as many as 18 teams in Key West,” said Ryan Beckley, who along with recent additions Cole Leibel and Chris Hopgood represents the Super Stock owners group, when I called him to share the stupidity.
That’s but one of a few thousand examples from offshore racing’s 2025-season rumor-mill cesspool. With two organizations duking it out for sanctioning body supremacy, that cesspool was destined to overflow this season. No matter where you stand or how passionate you are in your position, factionalism creates discord. It’s an unavoidable by-product.
And the rumor thrives on discord. Because no one gossips about good news.
So what’s the cure? There isn’t one. The rumor mill always has and always will exist in the sport—as it does in all competitive sports.
The only thing that will dial down the temperature is the end of the season. I look forward to the Englewood Beach event this weekend, where I’ve been invited to help veteran play-by-play man Mike Yowaiski with the livestream broadcast, and the Race World Offshore Key West Worlds in early November.
In fact, I heard a rumor—one I choose to believe but have nothing factual upon which to base my opinion—that this year’s Key West affair will attract its biggest fleet in recent memory.
But from the perspective of a worn-out fan and publisher, I’m also looking forward to it all being over. Cautious optimist that I am, I believe the off-season will do the sport some good. When cooler heads prevail, time away and distance might even lead to a positive reset.
Hope springs eternal. Or is that infernal? I forget sometimes.
Either way, we could all use a break.