Best Boat Crash Ever — The Sky-High Wreck That Launched Freedom One Racing’s Charitable Mission

By now, you’ve probably seen the eye-popping footage. A powerboat traveling over 200 miles per hour flips without warning, spins completely around in the air, and plunges into Arizona’s Lake Havasu.

The custom-built Skater 388 in that viral video is America One, the pride and joy of the Freedom One Racing Team based in Kansas City.

Noah Olah, a Freedom One crew member, was following in the tow boat that fateful day in late April 2025.

“I had a mini heart attack,” he recalls. “They hit the water at 170 miles an hour. Upside down.”

Michael Hledin, whose father Peter founded Skater Boats, was on the scene too. “I’ve never seen anything like it. It seemed like it went on forever.”

Miraculously, the boat’s drivers escaped without any life-threatening injuries, and the craft is expected to run again.

But even before the TikTok notoriety that came from the boat crash, the Freedom One team differed significantly from most of its counterparts.

Olah explains it this way…

“The boat is from a private investor. He wanted to stay anonymous and so did the drivers. We don't do sponsorships or anything, because it's not about the boat. It's about what we're doing, how we want to raise money for charity and how we want to give back. The boat is just a platform to do that.”

The team’s website, freedomoneracing.com, further spells out their philanthropic mission.

“We believe in the power of teamwork and community, using our passion for racing to unite supporters in a shared vision of positive change.”

Practically speaking, that means teaming up with local veterans’ groups and other charitable organizations at each event they attend. In fact, with their take from the Desert Storm Shootout (yes, in spite of the crash they still won the race), Freedom One was able to donate nearly $20,000 to Desert Storm charities and the Kiwanis Club.

“It's been a lot of fun working with those guys,” Hledin says. “They've got a great attitude. I mean, it's kind of a breath of fresh air.”

Freedom One started in true grassroots fashion just three years ago. One person called another, who called another, setting in motion the plan to build a shorter, lighter, and more powerful shootout style boat — using twin 522-cubic-inch blown alcohol Noonan Hemi engines.

Or what Olah calls “pretty much a drag car thrown into a boat.” With approximately 4,000 hp per engine, that’s hardly an exaggeration.

Because the team emphasizes “giving back,” he believes the bonds being built between members are particularly strong.

“You always want to find the best of the best. And I'll tell you what…you don't have to search halfway across the country to find the best. We found our best people in the same city we live in. We are a family.”

The spectacular way that Freedom One caught the public eye may have sidelined them for a while, but it hasn’t dampened their goal of racing for change. If anything, it’s left the team scrambling to keep up with requests for merchandise, and it’s opened new opportunities to take their message to more and more audiences.

At the beginning of the year, they had dreams of posting big (200+) speeds at the Lake of the Ozarks Shootout. The Havasu crash postponed those dreams. But they brought the boat to the 2025 Shootout anyhow, not to race — it was still damaged — but to let race fans have a look and support the group’s mission.

They ended up posting big numbers anyway, but in dollars rather than miles per hour. As a result of their presence at the Shootout Street Party and in the Shootout Vendor Village, they sold around $18,000 worth of merchandise and auctioned off the hatches that were damaged in the crash. Then they donated all proceeds to the Camden County Northwest Fire Protection District.

In all, Freedom One Racing raised more than $60,000 this year for charities in Lake Havasu, Ariz.; Seabrook, Texas (Texas Outlaw Challenge); and Lake of the Ozarks.

“The craziest part,” Olah says, “is that we could have done 300 miles an hour over that finish line, and we would have never gotten the recognition that we have from that crazy crash. It’s been phenomenal.”

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