Mike Nass has been hearing stories about the Sproat Lake regatta since he was a boy and this summer he finally got the chance to compete.
“I’ve been trying to [revive the regatta] since I was a little boy raised in this lake,” he says, “I’ve been passionate about boat racing my entire life so I’ve been beating the drum for a long time and the circumstances just presented themselves now.”
Mike first got into boats as a young boy when his father, Ray Nass, bought him a small three horsepower motor to go on the hydroplane that his grandfather had gotten him.
“He was raised on the lake and the lake means everything to him and anything to do with boating and racing, that’s his thing,” says Ray.
It’s become so much ‘his thing’ that Mike gave up a successful corporate career to start building boats at Haulin Nass Race Boats out in Richmond, B.C. Luckily, he’s been equally successful at that and took home the top prizes in the ‘Unlimited Outboard’ and ‘Unlimited’ classes at this year’s event.
With the success of this year’s event. Mike and Ray are hoping to repeat it for many years to come and they want to get children and teens involved too, with a 10 horsepower and under class for next year.
“Actually that’s what we started off as, we wanted kids to get involved,” says Ray.
“We’d teach them how to run the boats and the safety equipment they need, make them aware of the water and take away some of the craziness that you see [at the lake].”
Ray is also hoping to add other events to the regatta in the coming years.