Chris Rinker: The Real Deal

The IHRA F1 Powerboat Series has its share of family names. None carries more weight in American tunnel boat racing than Rinker.

Chris Rinker, 54, is four generations into a dynasty that stretches from a Midwest woodworking shop in the 1930s to the start pontoons of the IHRA F1 Powerboat Series today. He races number 52 out of Spring, Texas, and goes by a nickname – “The Real Deal” – that has become less a boast and more a statement of fact across nearly four decades of competition.

His entry into racing was not planned. In 1986, his uncle John handed him a boat at a race and suggested he give it a try. John Rinker never got that boat back. Chris won the national championship that same season. He was 16 years old.

Before F1, he had been racing Super Stock Tri-Hulls alongside his father, Jerry – “Scary Jerry” Rinker – who brought the family to Texas from Indiana during the economic pressures of the 1970s and eventually founded what would become Rinkers Boat World. Chris now runs it: a Top 100, 5-star-rated dealership with two locations serving the greater Houston area, Lake Conroe, and Lake Livingston. The racing and the business have never been separate worlds.

A French hull in Texas

What sets Rinker apart from much of the IHRA F1 field is the equipment beneath him. He runs two hulls, both built and designed by David Moore, the French constructor whose boats have been campaigned at the highest levels of international circuit racing, including the UIM F1H2O World Championship, where Moore hulls carried Philippe Chiappe to 3 consecutive world titles.

Moore’s reputation as a constructor is global. When British-American team JRM Racing sought technical expertise ahead of the 2022 F2 season, they brought Moore in as crew chief and radioman for Brent Dillard specifically because of his construction knowledge. His hulls are not easy to come by. Running two of them places Rinker in select company within American domestic racing.

Moore is based in Rouen, and the location is central to understanding his hulls. The 24 Heures Motonautiques de Rouen was raced on the Seine, 24 hours of continuous racing on rough, swirling river water. Moore built his construction philosophy watching his boats deal with those conditions lap after lap, hour after hour. The performance Rinker found in choppy water at Lake X was not a surprise to anyone familiar with where those hulls were developed.

One hull runs a Mercury two-stroke. The second carries Mercury Racing’s 250 APX – a 4.6-litre V8 four-stroke competition outboard introduced in 2024 and designed specifically for IHRA F1 class racing and UIM F2.

The record

The titles accumulated steadily. The F1 series championship in 2016. The 2023 F200 National Championship, the F200 World Speed Record at 127.26 mph set that same year, induction into the APBA Hall of Champions, and the APBA U.S. 1 National Champion title in points. Victory at the 2025 Alton Midwest Nationals F1 race. Crew chief James Chambers has been alongside him throughout.

Lake X

You don’t simply drive up to Lake X. Mercury’s Central Florida test facility sits behind a guard gate, surrounded by pine forest, and racing teams have been making the journey there for decades in pursuit of that extra mile per hour.

Rinker arrived there this week with the Moore hull, the 250 APX, and a week’s worth of problems to solve.

“At the beginning, motoring north was slow and tedious. Glancing to the left and seeing the iconic Lake X spotting tower gave me goosebumps.”
Chris Rinker

The conditions were not cooperative. Whitecaps on the main lake, spray flying, hulls taking a beating from every angle. The team retreated to Gator Cove, a sheltered pocket that offered calmer water – or at least the appearance of it. Cross-gusts off the tree line kept the surface unpredictable, and the wind never fully settled.

What changed over the course of the week was the boat.

“By week’s end we’d gotten so dialled in with the Moore hull that we blasted up and back to Gator Cove at almost wide-open throttle – like it was nothing. Faster you go, more it chewed up the chop. Learned quick: this boat handles rough water way better than you’d expect.”
Chris Rinker

The session was built around left-handers – the bread and butter of IHRA F1 racing in the United States. The Moore hull, built from carbon fibre to French precision tolerances, was doing exactly what it was designed to do.

“Throttle pinned, she just settled and bit through the turns. Cross winds shoved us wide, but she was easily brought back with no problems.”
Chris Rinker

The team also ran the Moore hull with the Mercury Racing 360 APX – a 4.6-litre V8 pushing 360 hp at 7,400 rpm, the engine built for the UIM F1H2O World Championship. The extra power suited the hull.

“The Moore seemed to engage and love more horsepower. Handled great with the 250 APX, but truly seemed to stick its chest out with the 360 APX. Acceleration pinned me back – howling up to redline, banging the limiter. Those lefts, even harder on the neck and body.”
Chris Rinker

Behind the scenes, crew chief James Chambers, Matt Smith, and Samantha “Texas Heat” Rinker kept the programme moving: stopwatches out, prop logs running, engine swaps executed without wasted motion. David DeWald supplied a range of test propellers, and the Mercury Race Team provided hands-on support throughout – opening the facility, assisting with powerhead changes, and working through every step alongside the Rinker crew.

By the end of the week, the numbers were locked. The 250 APX programme is confirmed for Port Neches and Shreveport.

2026 so far

At the season opener in Bradenton in February – the inaugural race under IHRA sanction – Chris finished sixth in the two-stroke Moore hull, a lap down on race winner Andrew Tate. The 2026 IHRA calendar runs to eight rounds and includes the return of the championship to Shreveport-Bossier for the Red River Rumble.

The family presence at Bradenton was typical Rinker. Ashton Rinker ran the other F1 entry in the family. Mason Rinker took the Tri-Hull victory. Four Rinkers competed across three classes on the Manatee River.

Chris Rinker has been racing since Ronald Reagan was in the White House. He still intends to win. The record suggests taking that seriously.