Cowboy & Indian Summer Tour, Part II—No-Wake Zone Confidential

Tedious as they are, long no-wake zones are good for one thing—and there were a few of them today at the inaugural Bago Big Bet Poker Run in Oshkosh, Wis.—at least if you’re a reporter covering a go-fast powerboat event from a DCB Performance Marine M37R Widebody catamaran. They give you a chance to interview your hosts and take a few photos.

And so it was this morning with Kiran Pinisetti and Kelly O’Hara, the owners of a 37-footer called Cowboy & Indian and powered by twin 500R outboard engines from Mercury Racing—the presenting sponsor of this weekend’s event—and this reporter.

Kelly O’Hara (left) calls Kiran Pinisetti his “brother from another mother.”

During a long idle on the Fox River after today’s first card stop on Lake Winneconne, Pinisetti and O’Hara explained how their friendship—and later a partnership in a catamaran from the Phoenix builder—evolved. It began almost 10 years ago when O’Hara sold his 2003 Fountain Powerboats 35 Lightning V-bottom. By pure happenstance, Pinisetti bought O’Hara’s former boat through Greg Weber at Sjogren Performance Marine in Northern Illinois. Pinisetti naturally had questions about the 35-footer and O’Hara, a gracious gentleman by nature, always made himself available to answer them. So a friendship developed between them.

Eventually, O’Hara took his new friend for a ride in his 36-foot MTI catamaran dubbed Holy Cow, II, in honor of the Fountain he dubbed Holy Cow. O’Hara, for the record, is a semi-retired dairy farmer in Upstate New York. In a nod to a horse-breeding business he operates with his wife, Jessica, Pinisetti—whose parents immigrated from India—renamed the O’Hara’s former Fountain Horse Play.

One ride in the MTI cat powered by Mercury Racing 700SCi engines and painted by Mark Morris of Visual Imagination was all it took to hook Pinisetti into the catamaran world.

“That’s just what friends do for friends,” O’Hara said, then laughed. “We take them for rides in catamarans and ruin V-bottoms for them.”

Pinisetti researched his options in depth—much like his friend, O’Hara, he doesn’t “wing it.” He talked to catamaran builders and owners. He read about different models.

But in the end, a common scene involving a decidedly uncommon duo during a Super Cat Fest event at the Lake of the Ozarks in Central Missouri convinced him to order a DCB.

Cowboy & Indian is the focal point of an experienced-based article series appearing on speedonthewater.com this season. Photo by Pete Boden copyright Shoot 2 Thrill Pix

“Early one morning, I saw Jeff Johnston and Tony Chiaramonte of DCB wiping down and taking the covers off their customers’ boats,” he recalled. “I said, ‘Those are the guys I want to do business with.”

A few months later, Pinisetti and his wife hitched a ride with Greg Harris and Yvonne Aleman on their first iteration of Mad Props, an M37R powered by Mercury Racing 450R outboards. He placed his order for an M37R soon after.

“When it came time to build, Kelly and I were talking and I said, ‘Hey, we go to all the same events, why don’t we partner on this boat?’” Pinisetti explained. “And now here we are.”

O’Hara picked up the story, “I was looking forward to someone I could enjoy events with, but also someone I could trust and who thinks the way I do about taking care of things,” he said. “We care for things very similarly.

“When we built the boat, we didn’t have one area of disagreement,” he added. “And here we are, 114 operating hours later, having a blast.”

Though O’Hara came up with the Cowboy & Indian handle for the boat, it was partly inspired and germinated by their former Holy Cow and Horse Play boats.

“One night we were on the phone and Kelly said, ‘How about Cowboy & Indian?’” Pinisetti recalled. “And I said, ‘That’s it. That’s it.’”

The long idle zone was coming to an end. There was time for just one more question.

The author (left) made the most of his idle time with Pinisetti and O’Hara today.

“What would I like people to take away from this article series?” Pinisetti said. “How fun it all is, the camaraderie and the charities that benefit from our hobby. It’s not just a bunch of guys with more money than sense. There is a tight bond between a lot of us, and a lot of that has to do with the money we raise for all these charities, which goes to good use.”

O’Hara smiled and nodded.

“Believe it or not, people have asked us how much are they paying you or how much is DCB paying you to do this article series,” he said, then chuckled again. “When I tell them ‘nothing,’ that was it was your idea, they can’t believe it.”

The reporter shook his head and chuckled. That was a new one for him.

“We’re going back on plane now,” O’Hara said. “Sit back.”

And then he hit the throttles.

Editor’s note: Look for complete coverage of the Bago Big Bet this weekend on speedonthewater.com.