Undeniable privilege that it is, riding around in other people’s dream-boats isn’t the best aspect of this job. Don’t misunderstand, that part is stupid-cool. Not for one moment do I forget it.
Yeah, I work hard and put in some crazy hours. So do a lot people. And they don’t get to have nearly as much fun marking a living. Hell, I traveled by boat twice to the Bahamas this summer, once with Deep Impact Custom Boats owner Mark Fischer in the second Deep Impact 499 center console, once with Florida Powerboat Club Owner Stu Jones in his snazzy Nor-Tech 390 sport center console.
Yet it is the colorful and unforgettable people involved, from world champion offshore racer Steve Curtis to marine insurance and finance man Devin Wozencraft, who make the go-fast boating community so damn fascinating. Minus the people involved, powerboats are just plastic and metal.
And San Diego’s John Caparell could well be the most colorful of them all in what has become a significant sample size of humanity I’ve experienced during this gig in the past 30 years.
Caparell, who is simply Kap to his friends, is a lifelong performance-boating fanatic. But he burst on the national scene in 2012 when he built a 32-foot Doug Wright catamaran powered by Mercury Racing OptiMax 300XS outboard engines.
It wasn’t that Kap discovered outboard-equipped pleasure-cats—far from it. But he saw the outboard-movement coming long before they took over the propulsion segment. And he wasn’t shy about saying it.
To say Caparell—a lawyer by trade who moonlighted as a pizza parlor owner—has a large personality understates things. Badly. His presence enters a room long before his body does.
But his passion and authenticity have always driven his bluster. He’s hard not to love.
“My 32 Doug Wright was the first open-cockpit-designed 32-foot pleasure cat Doug Wright built,” said Caparell, now retired from the law and “knocking on the door” of his 61st birthday, told me earlier this week. “It was rigged out West by Quality Performance Marine, and it was the poster-boat boat for Mercury 300XS OptiMax engines.
“It still has its original, 100-percent stock 300XS motors,” he continued. “The reason I haven’t upgraded is because the boat handles and flies perfectly level with them. I don’t want to alter the CG just for top speed. I prefer a light, superb-handling boat over a one-dimensional top-speed boat.”
That is, for the record, as calm as Kap gets.
During the 2020 Lake of the Ozarks Shootout in Central Missouri, Caparell showed up with a 24-foot Twister C-3 catamaran powered by a Mercury Racing 300R outboard engine and put on a show. His first pass produced 98-mph result. On his second run, he reached 100 mph.
“I dedicated my first run to Scott Reichow of Mercury Racing—he’s been a true friend for a long time and I wanted to recognize him for everything he’s done for me over the years,” he told speedonthewater.com co-publisher Jason Johnson later that day. “I’m happy with how the boat ran today—100 mph was my goal. The first run was pretty rough. Fortunately this is a fun boat to drive.
Worth noting? Rain fell, as tends to happen during the Shootout, during his 100-mph run.
That wasn’t Caparell’s first Shootout experience—nor was it his fastest. Running his 32-foot Doug Wright catamaran, he reached 115 mph during the 2013 affair.
“That was the fastest ever recorded with stock 300XS engines,” he recalled during this week’s interview.
Since then, Caparell and his wife, Lora, have added a 25-foot Avalon Tri-Toon equipped with a pair of 250XS outboards to their powerboat arsenal. He describes the 25-footer as “Lora’s boat.”
“I have three boats now, and every year it gets harder to pick one to run,” he added, then laughed.
One thing is certain: No matter what boat he chooses to pilot on any given day, John Caparell is a man of pure joy on and endless stoke. On or off the water, he always will be Kap, perhaps the most colorful character the go-fast boating world has ever known.