One week after eking out a fourth-place finish at the Columbia Cup, Auburn’s Dave Villwock and the U-16 Ellstrom Miss Elam Plus are on top of the unlimited hydroplane world.

This past weekend, Villwock and the U-16 made history at Seafair, taking home the Chevrolet Cup, Villwock’s 10th on the Lake Washington course, and breaking a record previously held by the legendary Bill Muncey.

“It feels great,” Villwock said. “It was an amazing weekend for all of us. It was definitely a Seafair to remember. To do double digits here (in wins), that’s something. Nobody has ever done that.”

Villwock and the U-16 grabbed the first-place finish on the rough waters by blowing away the rest of the field, including the U-1 Oh Boy! Oberto driven by national high-points leader Steve David.

After accumulating the most points in the preliminary heats, Villwock chose the inside lane in the unlimited finals and quickly took the lead, leaving the rest of the seven-boat field in his wake.

Jimmy King, driver of the Evansville, Ind.,-based U-3 Grandview on the Lake, took second with the sole piston-powered unlimited on the circuit. The U-1 Oberto suffered engine problems and finished sixth in the finals.

Villwock still trails David, 5,815 points to 5,566, in the season high-points chase.

For Villwock and the rest of the team, the win was a welcome change from their troubles in the Tri-Cities, where the U-16 was hampered by mechanical problems and dinged for two rules violations.

“The first thing that happened was we burned all the wiring out of the boat,” Villwock said. “When that happens, you can’t get it to run. We managed to get through that and were a little bit behind.”

Villwock and the U-16 were flagged for a lane infraction in their first heat, then were hit with a penalty for fuel flow the next day.

The troubles forced him to start the final heat in the trailer position, behind the other boats.

“We managed to work our way up but if you run a boat that fast through all that, you’re just going to break stuff,” he said.

With a broken sponson and other damage to the boat, the team came into Seattle with just three days to get ready for the Chevrolet Cup. But Villwock and the Ellstrom crew responded.

“It’s just like having a bad quarter in football, and we recovered,” he said.

The Chevrolet Cup win was the 59th career win for Villwock, putting him into rarefied air with the late Muncey, who had 62 wins, and Chip Hanauer, who has 61.

“I don’t know that one driver is better or worse than another driver. Bill brought a style to the sport, and Chip brought something a little different,” Villwock said. “In the end, I don’t know if how many wins are on the board matters.”

Regardless, Villwock will have two more chances to tie Hanauer this season, the first coming Aug. 23 in Evansville, Ind., a race that was almost cancelled.

“They had a lot of problems. The people who run it wanted to run purely an airshow,” Villwock said. “They didn’t really understand something that happened here when we tried to run the Blue Angels by themselves and it didn’t work really well. It’s like Pat O’Day says, ‘The hydros are the lynchpin that makes this whole bomb (Seafair) go off.’”

Villwock said Dr. Ken Muscatel, a hydro team owner and driver, stepped in and reorganized the Indiana event.

“He put together this event with car shows and barbecues, so we didn’t lose it,” Villwock said. “The race has a lot of history, so it would have been like losing Seattle.”

After Evansville, the unlimited boats will take a break until November when they will travel overseas to Qatar to race the final event of the season.