Boat Racing

Throttle-mashing offshore powerboat races and inland speedboat circuits across Leonida's endless waterways.

Powerboat racing is the most expensive way to get wet in Leonida. The offshore circuit runs from Vice City bay out through the Keys in long, brutal point-to-point races where the chop will rearrange your spine and the competition is half sponsored pros, half people you're not supposed to be seen with. The inland circuit is tighter and faster, running around marker buoys through Watson Bay and across Lake Leonida, where the hazards include cypress stumps, slow-moving pontoon boats, and the occasional bemused alligator. Boat handling is fully physics-based — weight shift, trim, throttle feathering — and the upgrade tree covers hulls, outboards, and the more custom work that the smuggler-circuit crowd specializes in. Winning enough races eventually earns you invitations to events whose rules allow 'contact,' which is the marine-racing euphemism for ramming.