There isn't any. There's a motor the size of The City of Vineland, two seats, a hull resembling President Bush's Rocker's brain - small and narrow - a gas pedal, a steering wheel and some writing in the back that says, "If it's too loud then you're too old." But no seatbelts.

There's a good reason for this. If the boat flips at 80 mph, and it could happen, you'll want to get flung as far away as possible from the hull and the hamburger processing plant at the end they call a propeller. Don't worry, you will, like a rock from a slingshot. Then the divers in the rescue boat will come by to wrap your ribs in duct tape, or something equally medicinal, so you can quick change the oil in the thing and get back out there for the next heat.

You don't have to go to Daytona or anywhere else outside of southern New Jersey to see some great racing. Come watch them run the skiffs and garveys, boats born and bred in New Jersey. They started as workboats, clammers, but the motors just kept getting bigger and bigger and before long they were having so much fun they decided to forget about the work part and just go out and race the dang things on Sundays in the Barnegat Bay. Nowhere else in the world will you see a show like this, because nowhere else in the world are there boats quite like New Jersey's skiffs and garveys. They're so motored-up that they're about as subtle as a fist in the face.

This racing, it's got the feel and smell of NASCAR in the early days, back when the drivers weren't long off the back roads and the cops weren't far behind - when racing wasn't a business plan, it was a big motor with headers, and by God if you're gonna try to pass me you better do it quick because I might just bump you right out to the wall.

It's not all tattoos and testosterone either, but that's part of it. Put it this way: You won't find many Land's End models in the parking lot. One tourist did wander in on one of the recent race days at Beach Haven on a fancy full-suspension mountain bike, wearing the colors and the tights, all the urban-rider stuff. He stuck out like a penguin in a pool hall. Funny thing about the money though. That guy may have spent $3,000 on his bicycle, but one of the boat racers said he had $17,000 just in his motor. Toys can be expensive no matter what your taste.

This kind of racing brings in the folks who do it for the love and the thrill, not the money, the kind who like the sound of eight pistons hitting 7,000 rpm. It's my kind of sound too. For me it all started back in fifth grade, I think it was, when one of my older cousins took me for a ride on his Triumph Bonneville motorcycle -- right down State Street, 70 mph in a 25, directly past my grammar school. The sound of those straight pipes went directly to the place in my brain that manufactures adrenaline. From there it was downhill, to a series of motorcycles and fast cars. So when I saw these boats, only 16.5 to 19 feet long and stuffed with huge motors, I had to get a ride in one. Instead I got a ride in two. Life is good.

First was Cranmer, who lives in Waretown. They call him "Toes" because he blew off part of his left foot in a duck hunting accident back when he was 18. Not a problem. It's his right foot that works the accelerator pedal, and that's most of what you do in these boats. You stomp it down until your teeth want to come out of your head and the turn buoys are coming fast, and then to prepare for the turn you basically keep it down, until the boat is skidding and bouncing and plowing through wakes and suddenly, somehow, you're still rightside up and pointed at the next straightaway. From inside the boat it feels a little like you're riding a bull. Honest. I rode a bull, once, for a very brief period. I'm not sure which is worse, except it's less likely that the boat, after it throws you, will turn around and come back and try to run you over to finish the job off right.

In Cranmer's boat there are two little hand-holds for the passenger. Once Cranmer gets into it, which is basically from the time the motor turns over, you can't hold on well enough to feel safe. I really thought I was going to get flung out, but then I calmed down by telling myself, 'Hey, they wouldn't let me out here if they thought I was going to get flung.' About five minutes later another rookie rider got thrown up in the air and out of the boat. I think he was OK, but he probably needed a lot of duct tape.

The co-pilot's job is to keep an eye on the oil pressure gauge, the other boats and the flags that signal whether everything is going OK in the race or whether somebody has broken down or flipped. The course is an oval, a half-mile long, with just enough straightaway to make the turns interesting. The acceleration is intense, yes, but you'd expect that from boats with up to 800 horsepower pushing such small hulls. It's the cornering that sets this kind of racing apart. Every corner is an adventure in physics, and it is hard to say no to physical laws on a consistent basis. When four or five or six boats go into the first turn together, all you see is white spray and prayers.

When they were deciding which driver I was going to ride with, somebody said something that made me wonder. Bill Irving, who is the dean of this kind of racing, having done it for 30-plus years before retiring to become the race-day announcer and unofficial historian, looked at somebody and said, "We'll put him in with Toes, and then later on we'll put him in a safe boat." This caused everybody to smile. Everybody but me.

It turned out that Toes, who drives skiffs, likes to keep his foot in it. He used to race stock cars, like his father, but he loves the boats too. Doesn't matter too much. As long as it's fast he likes it.

"You'll be fine," somebody told me. "Just say a few Hail Marys."

I'm glad he took me out for a couple practice laps without any other boats around. It would have been much more embarrassing if my helmet blew off during an actual race.

Let me say one thing here. I know how to buckle a race helmet. I guess I was a little excited, is all, because it turned out I didn't get it on real tight. During the first lap the wind got under it and started pushing it back on my head. And I know you're thinking, "OK, no big deal, you just push it back down and tighten up the strap and you're good to go." Yeah right. Not in this lifetime was I going to let loose even one of my hands. If you think I was going to let go with two hands while Toes and his boat were bouncing around like a jitterbug in boiling water, you've seriously misjudged my ability to be scared.

So when the boat hit about 80 mph, off it went. The problem at that point was -- well there were three problems. One, I was going to be embarrassed no matter what happened. I imagined that right at that moment, Irving was announcing over the public address system that the reporter out there had just lost his head. Of course, I had no idea because the motor is too loud to even hear yourself scream. Two, if the boat flipped, I could get hurt. Three, I had to take one of my hands out of the hand-hold to slap Toes on the back, so he could stop looking forward for a second and realize what was happening. I am happy to report that he slowed down anyway, probably to see if my heart was still inside my chest, and I made myself let go and give him a slap. When he turned and saw my butt-naked head his eyes got real big for a second, probably wondering, just like I was, whether he was going to get in trouble. But when we turned around the guys in the rescue boat had already found the helmet and were waving it at us. Turns out Toes has more patience than most people think. Otherwise I would been swimming back.

It's great family entertainment, this kind of racing. Dads, moms, grandparents, kids of all ages, all gathered around to watch my head blow. It was grand.

My second ride came with Al Martino of Toms River. He races a garvey, which has a flat bottom. For his ride I cinched that helmet on so tight we could have broken the sound barrier. I have a feeling Martino took it easy for me, because it felt like his boat was on rails in the turns. Butter. I liked that. But I like the idea of a seatbelt even more.