Henry Talbot’s ascent to the top of the Bermuda Power Boat Association pecking order has been nothing shy of meteoric.

The 30-year-old business manager began racing powerboats in 2011 but it soon became apparent that he had much more to offer.

In 2013, Talbot was invited to join the racing committee and during a three-year period he went from serving as a flag marshall to vice-commodore and eventually commodore after being elected to the top post at the association’s last annual general meeting.

“I began racing in 2011 in a 21-foot Skater in the C-Class and then I stepped up one time,” Talbot said. “I was asked to be flag marshall because somebody had stepped out midway through the season and it kind of pretty much stuck.”

Since assuming his new role in November Talbot has wasted no time getting to the serious business of trying to revive the sport and bolster the association’s membership.

“Powerboating is not like it used to be back in the day, so I want to bring the sport back alive,” Talbot said.

“We are just trying to do different things in the club to bring the people back to certain events. I want to get everybody back out like it used to be and make it more exciting.”

Reviving the association’s youth programme is also among Talbot’s mandate during his initial two-year term as commodore.

“I am really trying to get the junior programme up and going,” he said. “We have a junior programme but it’s been kind of slack lately.

“I am trying to get the upgrade for the motors. There’s a six horsepower law for juniors until they are 16 and when they get around 13 they lose interest because the boats aren’t fast enough anymore and they get tired of them.

“I have a meeting with the Minister of Transport next week to see if we can get an upgrade.”

Talbot admits that the tough economic times in recent years has taken a heavy toll on his association, with many members scaling back on competing regularly because of the high costs of doing so.

However, he remains optimistic that the trend will change for the better as the economy gradually improves.

“It’s like every year you are basically scratching around just to make ends meet,” Talbot said. “We used to race every week or every other week but it started to get a little costly and people stopped coming out to back-to-back races.”

The powerboat season kicks off with a Grand Prix at the Royal Naval Dockyard on Sunday. The event will showcase entries from five classes.

“Everyone is very excited and race fans can expect a lot of action,” Talbot said. “We are running alongside of the Heritage Wharf so that everyone can basically see what’s happening.

“We don’t know what course we are going to run on the day because it all depends on the wind direction. The course will be determined on the day and I want the boating public to be cautious of us during the races because safety is a main priority.”

One of the classes returning this year is the one-design Batboats invented by Ocke Mannerfelt.

“We had the class open last year but nobody really came out,” Talbot said. “But now we have three Batboats so that’s a new class that we are running right and hopefully that’s going to be a very exciting class.”

This season’s powerboat schedule will feature ten races over six months that will be held at various venues.

“We have different venues all around the Island so there’s something different,” Talbot said. “But Ferry Reach is still our main base.”

All races will start at 1pm with the exception of August’s Round the Island Race which gets under way at 2pm.