Rather than upload less than great phone pics, here are a couple of links that will give all my ATX brothers a flavor of the boats from around the country -- up here this weekend.
Awesome as usual.

Races start tomorrow.  Today will be a fun day as the competitors, and the normal weekend crowd with big machines, blast the main channel warming up and dialing in.  Going to head out there this morning, bring some coffee, kick back and float -- wait and watch. 

http://www.gojim.tv/Photo_Files/Shootout_2014/Thursday/Gallery/index.html

http://midwestboatparty.com/forum/showthread.php?39693-Offical-Shootout-Picture-Thread

That thread is absolutely fantastic already. Please keep me updated with pic messages and let me know how Qatar does in between beers! :)

Will do.  Headed out in about an hour for the 32 mile run up the lake to Captain Ron's and the massive 2 mile long raft-up.  With luck I'll get another front-row position as I had last year.

Hot as blazes up here, and big humidity.  Forecast is for today to be the hottest day of the year; 101-102, which means we'll probably see competitors go for big numbers during this morning's passes.

You should be able to see the live stream here all day...9A - 5P
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/lake-race

Holy cow!!!  Did you see the Outerlimits flip?

Saw the video on Boatfreaks, hope everybody is ok.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LuxLHigV90

Wow!! That was rough. I hear Mike walked away, but the other occupant was removed on a back board. Prayers out. I saw that boat in may at the factory. OL makes one helluva canopy.

Wow that was nuts!  Not that it is ever lucky to flip a boat but at least they landed upright and not with the cockpit under water.  Hope all involved makes a full recovery.  But I do wonder why they did not let out when it first started to lift. :o

The throttle man who was injured is Mike Fiore who is owner and founder of OuterLimits. Sounds serious. Crazy crash

http://www.newstribune.com/news/2014/aug/23/powerboat-wrecks-lake-ozarks-shootout-saturday/

This view shows the boat better after it landed, Terrible compression fractures across the hull from impact.  Can't be good for the guys in the seats.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXCN1zAVrZ0

What a day.  We tied up about 1/4 mile from the end of the course, on the front row.  The Outerlimits flip occurred directly, and I mean directly in front of us.  Very scary stuff.  It's amazing that anyone could survive that -- and fortunate they did.  IMO, the response time from the emergency fleet was a bit slow, but that's just my subjective opinion. 

The Sheik's record breaking 244MPH run in his Mystic was something to behold.  The boat was on rails -- flat, level and solid.  The sound as it blew by was intense.  I read an article in LakeExpo this morning where he said he let up on the throttles just slightly, and he thinks they were pushing 250 through the finishing gate.  A long shot, but it's possible he may try again this morning.  Some are also speculating that My Way, last year's record breaker at 224, may show up today.  No one has seen the boat all weekend, and some of the local boat freaks were saying this morning that there were some big race boats getting moved around from the main HQ storage facility last night to make room for another racer?  Who knows.  I don't think we're going to make the run up the the course by water this morning -- but I may jump in the truck and head to Captain Ron's to watch by land.

Overall was another fantastic day on the water for Shootout this year.  The spectator fleet was off the hook as always.  The cruiser floatillas are something to behold.  Must have been hundreds of millions of dollars worth of fiberglass tied off.  Unreal.

More reports later.

I2D

Mike Fiore passed away from his injuries this evening. Boat safe all.

That's terrible news!  Thoughts and prayers for his family. 

I just read that. That is terrible. Very sad.

Seems like safety equipment has a long way to go if that can happen in such a no-expense spared boat. A huge loss.

Incredibly tragic and sad turn of events and outcome.  I'm no expert, but it seems to me the boat itself displayed amazing durability and safety construction given the forces involved.  From what I saw first-hand unfold directly in front of me, and from footage I've seen of other high speed closed canopy blow-overs,  I'm not sure what else can be done to increase passenger safety and disaster avoidance in these closed canopy machines running at those speeds.  Perhaps an ejection system similar to fighter jets?

What a terrible loss. I wish they could get a handle on these cat blow overs. Seems like with basically an unlimited budget they could come up with something.

I saw an article a while back talking abt rapid deploying sea anchors. Haven't heard any more abt them.

In2Deep wrote on Aug 28^th, 2014 at 9:00am:

Incredibly tragic and sad turn of events and outcome.  I'm no expert, but it seems to me the boat itself displayed amazing durability and safety construction given the forces involved.  From what I saw first-hand unfold directly in front of me, and from footage I've seen of other high speed closed canopy blow-overs,  I'm not sure what else can be done to increase passenger safety and disaster avoidance in these closed canopy machines running at those speeds.  Perhaps an ejection system similar to fighter jets?

I'm no expert, but it seems like NASCAR and F1 can have far more violent crashes yet the drivers walk away routinely. I'm not sure what the standard is in boat racing but it seems like there's room to improve in restraints. Hard to say since little is known about his injuries though.

You are right though, absolutely incredible that boat kept so well together.

I think that any boat that goes over 120 mph should have to have safety features like the drag boats.  I do believe that they should include capsules that will separate upon impact. This has saved many lives in drag boat racing.