Circuits change
Between the 70s and the early 80s the circuits were modified. In turns, instead of the classic three buoys, two were positioned (occasionally even just one) and furthermore the development was reduced from 2000 m (850 m of straight plus 150 m for each of the turns) to 1600 m. It is clear that these changes tended to favor the catamarans compared to the three-pointers: the latter, in fact, were doubly penalized, not being able to exploit the advantages offered by the tight turn (indeed they were forced on average to travel 15% more "road" than the catamarans) and not being able to make the greater speed prevail on the "long" straights.
The future of the inboard racing boats therefore now seems quite "marked" for the racer in favor of the catamaran (the first with direct propeller shaft transmission, the second with stern drive).

After the 1979 Targa FIM, in 1980 the Italian Powerboating Federation organized the Italian Championship of the R3 2000 cc class over the distance of four races: Milan-Idroscalo, Sacca di Colorno, Cremona and Casale Monferrato.
Nicola Mora, the only driver to compete with a catamaran, won the title by taking his Molinari-Alfa Romeo to success in almost all the scheduled heats. In fact, at the first seasonal appointment at the Milanese Idroscalo, he obtained a victory and a fifth place, while at Sacca di Colorno and Cremona he was first in both races. The only failure was at Casale Monferrato where, after having won the championship, he collected two retirements. In the final classification of the first Italian Championship of the R3 2000 cc class, we find the winner of the 1979 Targa FIM, Francesco Manfredini, in second place overall. Mario Pecci, Ermes Prospero and Pierluigi Calderoni also performed well, challenging the winner on several occasions despite competing with three-point boats. In addition to the Italian R3 Championship, the R3N 2000 cc Championship is also held, with only three-point boats in the water and taking place over six events: Piacenza, Boretto, Lignano, Auronzo, Casale Monferrato and Milano-Idroscalo.


Titles won by Nicola Mora
A particularly "on the ball" Nicola Mora also wins this title at the wheel of his well-tested Lucini and Erigerlo-Alfa Romeo racer, fighting strenuously, in the circumstance, against fierce opponents such as: Virgilio Molinari, the debutant Adriano Muggiati, Ermes Prospero, Alberto Mammucari, Mario Pecci and Francesco Manfredini. As proof of the excellent competitiveness of his teams, Mora who entrusts the tuning of the Alfa Romeo engines to the expert preparer Carlo Faccetti (a driver of Gran Turismo and Sport Prototype cars), decides to take part, with the R3 2000 cc catamaran, in the Due Ponti Trophy. After having maintained the lead of the race for the entire first of the five scheduled laps in front of opponents such as Petrobelli and Ulrich equipped with vehicles of much higher displacement, he is forced to retire due to a mechanical problem.

The European Championship of the R3 2000 cc is awarded in Lignano Sabbiadoro with only Italian drivers at the start. Unfortunately, in these categories the withdrawal of foreigners, in international races, is no longer news.
In addition to the Italian victories, Nicola Mora, dominating in three of the four scheduled heats, also boasts the Continental Title, giving a further clear demonstration of the high potential of his catamaran. Behind him, in the final classification, we find Amleto Ruggeri, a very important opponent, whose palmares of the last seasons speaks for itself. Mora, in the first heat, dominates with a clear advantage over Ruggeri himself who, being the reigning European Champion, does not want to lose and in the two subsequent heats, trying to recover, suffers a double downgrade for early start. The other competitors always finish far behind. Despite Ruggeri winning in the fourth and final heat, he is still forced to leave the place of honor to the deserving Cremonese driver Francesco Manfredini. Scrolling down the rankings we find Franco Cantando in fourth place and Mario Pecci in fifth. All the competitors use Alfa Romeo engines.

In Sabaudia the Entrobordo Corsa of the R3 class are back in the running for the assignment of the World Championship.
With Amleto Ruggeri, the title holder, absent, the line-up includes four Italian pilots: Nicola Mora (with the catamaran), Ermes Prospero, Francesco Manfredini and Franco Cantando (with the classic three-pointers) and the Frenchmen Yves Painvain and Didier Jousseaume, the first always with a three-pointer, the second with a newly designed catamaran. I want to focus my attention on this catamaran because, instead of the Frenchman, our very famous pilot Renato Molinari should have been at the helm.
In fact, in the week before the competition, his very well-known shipyard spread the news that an innovative and very fast catamaran was ready.
With the intention of wanting to include this vessel and its pilot in the national team, the Italian Motorboat Federation, which had already selected the team members, launched the proposal to carry out a qualification test right in Sabaudia the day before the race.
The total renunciation of our already selected pilots who rightly did not want to risk compromising their means in an inappropriate qualifying test and threatened not to show up at the start of the championship, convinced the FIM and the well-known Lombard shipyard to entrust the boat to the Frenchman Jousseaume, who willingly accepted.
The power of the vessel, however, did not make the difference; the transalpine did not even finish the first heat and did not show up for the following ones.
In the first and third heats Nicola Mora got the better of Ermes Prospero, but was forced to retire in the second and also in the fourth due to a broken connecting rod, thus giving the victory to the aforementioned Veronese pilot.
The latter in fact, with the victory in the second and fourth heats plus two second places, regained the world title seven years later.


Eugenio Molinari World Champion of the R°°
From Sabaudia we move to the south of our peninsula to tell what may seem to everyone the most relevant novelty of the 1980 season in the context of international inboard racing, that is the "rebirth" of the racers without limitation (R°°) who on the magnificent sea of ​​Syracuse, compete for the coveted world title in the event valid as the Italian Grand Prix.
In the Roll of Honour of the category it is noted that only three times has the World Championship been awarded and in all cases it was won by American drivers: Bill Muncey in 1969, Dun Charles in 1970 and John Huganir in 1976. Races disputed with the total absence of European drivers.
In our country, after the glories of the 50s and 60s, when the category of powerful racers was called KD and the last edition of the 7 Litre APBA World Championship was held in 1970 on the Po in Cremona, these large-displacement boats, which were also few in number, have no longer attracted any particular interest among the experts. The only participations are limited to long-distance races such as the Raid Pavia-Venezia and the Trofeo Due Ponti.
In Syracuse, the wait to have the American pilots in the race turns out to be in vain, just as vain are the rumours regarding the construction of certain "racing machines" pompously advertised on the eve (there is also talk of brand new catamarans). To make the competition international, two Swiss pilots take to the water: Paul Hoffmann on an Abbate-Chrysler and the "legendary" Joseph Ulrich, always fond of Italian competitions, with his historic "barcone" from the Livio Molinari shipyard powered by a BPM.
The quality of the boats present, even for the Italian pilots, is certainly not first-rate: Giovanni Cima has a Timossi-Chrysler, while Luciano Gandola, Adriano Dotti and Benedetto Catano use Mostes single-hull boats with BPM 8000 cc engines; complexes normally rated in the Turismo Veloce (TVN2) classes that have nothing in common with the classic three-pointers of the Corsa categories.
The organizing committee, however, having to increase the reduced presence of Italian pilots and having set up a long circuit (3000 m to be repeated seven times each heat) on rather choppy waters, approves the inclusion of single-hull boats as well.
The great champion Eugenio Molinari lines up with his three-point "Soncor" powered by a BPM 8000 cc: it is a hull of his recent construction rated for the Unlimited Sport class (S°°) but which in this circumstance is considered a Racing class.
Molinari, securing a victory in the third heat and three second places in the others, takes the world title by showing, without however being cruel, his indisputable superiority.
The other heat victories go to Ulrich, Cima and Dotti. The final classification sees, behind the aforementioned winner, Cima, Dotti and the Swiss Hoffmann and Ulrich.


The relaunch of the R1 class
In 1980 the inboard Formula Fiat 128 1300 cc boats see a drop in attendance mainly due to the passage of some drivers to the higher category, but also because the R1 1000 cc class is revitalized. For the record, it is fair to point out that the Italian Championship was held and won by the Bergamo driver Giulio Grippa.
The R1 1000 cc class, recognized by the UIM, is probably the only one at European level, among the Entrobordo Corsa, to boast a fair number of pilots and includes among the winners of the World Championship also our Casalini and Colnaghi. By virtue of these reasons the FIM, includes it in the calendar and organizes a series of interesting national races.
The response of the Italian pilots is positive and in the water the fleet of boats is very heterogeneous. You can see everything: boats not of recent construction like some "real" R1 of British and Italian manufacture, a hull of the rather dated Bianchi shipyard, ex three-point that Tullio Abbate had destined for the "famous" Formula ANP, some Lucini and Frigerio ex formula Fiat 128 that abandoned the original engines using engines with 1000 cc displacement derived from the Fiat 127 car.
Among the various noteworthy engines it is right to point out the Greetham of Giuseppe Colnaghi, the Hillman of Angelo Palazzi and the glorious Fiat Abarth used by Walter Maltinti and Michele D'Angella. The preparers that stand out are: Branca, De Virgilis, Zoni and Speroni and Brazzi; furthermore, although it does not appear in the official rankings, from the driver's statements reported in specialized magazines it is clear that the driver Adriano Muggiati occasionally raced the then brand new HBM 6 cylinders by the preparer Franco Migliavacca, obtaining two victories at the Idroscalo in Milan.
The same engine seems to have been used once again by Adriano Casucci in the Cremona race and then not presented again by the designer, hoping to propose it again as truly competitive the following year (which however, as we will see, will not happen).

In 1980, for the aforementioned R1 category, the World Championship was held on the Po, in Casale Monferrato.
The hope of seeing the strong British riders in the race, who boast a long tradition in this class and several international titles won in the recent past, was in vain; the defection was total. It is likely that the main reason for this surprising and questionable renunciation was due to the uncertainty that, for several weeks, weighed on the date and location of the race, already postponed several times. In the end, in the water, the comparison was miserably reduced to our five riders of the national team: Colnaghi, Maltinti, Cantando, Palazzi and Casucci.
Colnaghi, on this occasion, decides to show up not with his tried and tested Noone-Greetham three-pointer with forward steering, but with a new catamaran by Renato Molinari powered by a Fiat 128 1300 cc 16 valve twin-cam injection monobloc with 140 HP prepared by Romeo Ferraris, who reduces the displacement to 1000 cc and connects it to a Mercury stern drive.
With this beautiful complex Colnaghi, who returns to the circuit after a few seasons dedicated only to inline races, knows no rivals and wins the first three heats which mathematically earn him the world title. He leaves the victory in the fourth and final race to Angelo Palazzi.


Antonio Petrobelli's return to competition
A separate chapter deserves the sector of long-distance or inline races.
In the 40th Raid Pavia-Venezia, occasionally held in July, we witness a great competitive return by Antonio Petrobelli who, two years after the serious accident in Syracuse, secures the overall victory with a time of 2h 14' 54" and an average of 170.348 km/h, racing a new R°° class racer built by the Celli shipyard and powered by a BPM 8000 cc.
Unfortunately Petrobelli will not be participating in the R°° World Championship in Syracuse, but the Paduan driver's future plans probably include the intention of competing exclusively in line races, abandoning the circuit forever.
Returning to the Raid, it is also worth noting the excellent second place overall by Carlo Rasini, also returning after two years of absence from racing. With a brand new Renato Molinari catamaran powered by an Evinrude in the Unlimited Outboard (OZ) class, he completes the course in a time of 2h 29' 17" preceding in third position the ever indomitable Francesco Manfredini, racing with his Popoli-Alfa Romeo racer in the R3 2000 cc class and in fourth the surprising Adriano Muggiati, making his debut with an R3N Lucini and Frigerio-Alfa Romeo.

Giuseppe Colnaghi, after winning the R1 World Title, reaches a further milestone by winning the Centomiglia del Lario for the third consecutive time (average speed 144.356 km/h). For this feat he uses an unlimited inboard catamaran built by the Renato Molinari shipyard and powered by a Mercruiser engine.

Finally, it is worth mentioning the umpteenth overall victory of the new World Champion R°° Eugenio Molinari in "his" Giro del Lario.