Shortwave Sportfishing wrote:
One of the guys in my rod and gun club just took delivery of a Skeeter
SX 300 - 22' high performance bass boat with a Yamaha 300 HPDI.

Delivered yesterday evening there was no time to actually put it
through it's paces so we took it out early this morning to see exactly
how it would run and play with the jack plate a little.

To say that this boat is a screamer is an understatement. After
playing with the jack plate and trim positioning, 90 mph is entirely
conceivable. After my experience with the four blade approach to
props, he went the same way and the simple fact is that the
acceleration is strangely reminiscent of my Corvette - or what
Eisboch's M5 must feel like - it's pure and clean - you know you are
in a rocket.

Bow lift is very short as the boat just seems to jump up on plane with
little or no urging - the bow lifts for a second, the boat slides
forward and there you are. I didn't want to go for the 90 mph, but at
75, it was fairly steady with a minimum of chine walking. I imagine
in a strong breeze, as it happened came up after we recovered at the
launch ramp, you'd want to keep the hull in closer contact with the
water - the potential for a bow flip is high as the boat at speed
leaves very little hull in the water.

This boat is loaded with every conceivable option that you can fit on
a Skeeter from three bank 15 amp battery charger for the Minn Kota Max
101 trolling motor to the hydraulic jackplate to all the creature
comfort options you can put on a boat of this type. The dash board
layout looks nice and doesn't jump out at you as being something
different like the Ranger Z series or all digital like you see in Bass
Cats.

As in center consoles, a bass boat is a bass boat, but in this case,
Skeeter took some pointers from Ranger and did a good job with locker
placement, live wells and overall appearance. The boat is styled in
classic Skeeter fashion with the straight deck lines and classic
graphics package, but the water contact surface has been changed a
little to provide a more comfortable ride. The one thing I would be a
tad leery of is a large lake or river scenario with high wind and
waves in the 2/3 foot range - there is so much available power and the
aerodynamic nature of the hull could cause unintentional consequences
- like a flip or roll.

Skeeters have always been in the "also ran" category in bass boats and
often seen as Nitro often is - good sound basic boat, but nothing to
write home about. This boat is a little different - it may look like
the same old Skeeter but there isn't much old about the boat at all.

It was a fun ride.

I could never see the point of pounding along in a boat at a high rate
of speed. Give me sure & steady...although a sailboat sure does seem a
bit too slow when covering long distances.