Looking for Wamego native Shelby Ebert? You'll find 'The Fastest Woman on Water' going 180 mph

A passion developed as a youth in Wamego has led Shelby Ebert to become “The Fastest Woman on Water.”

As the digital marketing and sales coordinator at Heartland Motorsports Park, Ebert does more than just watch fast cars. When her day job is done, she travels the country as a top-flight speed boat racer.

Speed boat racing is in the Ebert family

“My dad has been racing boats for more than 30 years,” Ebert said. “When I was a kid, I told my parents that I wanted to race, too. I started racing jet skis when I was 14 and then made my way through the classes, getting faster and faster as I’ve gotten older.”

Faster indeed. At the level Ebert currently competes at, the boats may reach 180 mph. It’s nothing like driving a ski boat at the local lake.

“I grew up progressing from jet skis to an open boat, like a sportsman class boat. Now I race a pro-modified drag boat,” Ebert said. “It’s like drag racing, if you imagine a drag strip on water on a 1,000-foot course.

“I started out going 60 miles an hour, and just progressed to 100, and then 120 and 150. Now I go 180. I guess I’m a little bit jaded because I’ve progressed gradually, and it’s what I’ve always done on the weekends.”

As you might imagine, flying across the water at that speed comes with a degree of danger.

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“With this type of boat, you’re strapped into a capsule with a roll cage. You wear a helmet with oxygen,” Ebert said. “The way the boat is designed, if you were to be in a crash, the capsule is thrown away from the boat, and would float for a little while. But then the capsule will fill up with water and eventually sink, which is why you have oxygen. There are divers who will come and get you from the bottom of the lake.

“There have been a couple of times where I’ve been in rough water and got a little bit concerned for my safety. But I’ve never been to the point that I was scared of my boat or felt like I was close to crashing. There have been just a couple of times where I was a little bit hesitant about what was going on.”

Shelby Ebert was going to school on weekdays and racing on weekends

One of few women in the sport of drag boat racing, Ebert has contended with men at every level for the top spot in the field. In 2015, at the age of 20, Ebert won Lucas Oil Drag Boat Racing Series Driver of the Year in her classification.

But few people knew about it. She lived a double life, studying accounting and marketing at Kansas State University during the week and racing drag boats on the weekends.

“It was kind of funny. I would come back from races, even after I won a world championship, and pretty much no one knew it,” Ebert said. “I didn’t get the normal college experience that a lot of people have. I didn’t do the sorority, I didn’t go to the football games on the weekends. I was working on boats with my dad on the weekends, and we were going racing in the summer and in the spring and fall.

“But still it was so much fun. I had an actual career going on in the background that nobody knew about while I was working toward my degree.”

Ebert’s parents, Todd and Janet Ebert, continue to play a big role in her success. The owners of E&R Machine in Wamego — makers of components for big machinery — Todd and Janet transitioned over time from the traditional parental role to teammates, and eventually to support staff.

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“It’s a very different dynamic for us,” Ebert said. “They’re still my parents, but when I turned 21, I became a professional drag boat racer that was creating a brand and looking for sponsorships. It was a business. We started selling shirts and merchandise. I was the face of a brand. All of that made me grow up. It turned into a family/partner business dynamic. My parents work for me now, in a sense.”

The example her parents set and her college education helped Ebert navigate the business side of racing.

“I majored in accounting and marketing at K-State because I was starting to get involved in the promotion of my racing team, to try to get sponsorship dollars to continue to race,” Ebert said. “As you move up, things get more expensive. You have to create a brand and get sponsorship if you want to progress.

“My parents have owned their own business for a long time, and I grew up listening to the way they talk about their business. So to have a business partnership with them, that we created from scratch, is really cool.”

Shelby Ebert found role models in NHRA female drivers

Ebert had no female role models in the boat racing world to look up to, so she found inspiration in Ashley Force and Erica Enders, drivers in the National Hot Rod Association (NHRA).

“My role models were both from the NHRA because there were no women racing in the pro drag boat racing category,” Ebert said. “I knew that was what I wanted to become, but there were essentially no women to look up to. It was very male-oriented.

“There are a few women in pro drag boat racing now. And there are a lot of girls in the lower ranks doing great things, beating the boys, which is always fun to watch. And it’s always fun to have little girls come up and say, ‘I want to be like you.’ They see the pink boat and our pink shirts and they love it.

"If I can give one little girl inspiration to follow her dreams, then my job is done for the day.”

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It was only natural for Ebert to put her knowledge of the racing industry to work in a career. In 2018, she was hired to manage digital communication and promotion of Heartland Motorsports Park.

Ebert said she and her father have toyed with the idea of getting into racing on land, but for now she is focused on becoming the fastest person, not only woman, on water. In 2018, she claimed the Lucas Oil Drag Boat Racing Series 2018 World Finals in her classification. But the overall season championship in her current classification — Pro Modified — has thus far eluded her.

“The big thing that I want to accomplish is to win a (Pro Modified) championship,” Ebert said. “I’ve come so close. I’ve won a lot of races and come within a round of winning a championship a couple of times, and it’s just slipped away. So that’s my ultimate goal.”

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When can you see Shelby Ebert race next?

Ebert will continue her quest over Labor Day weekend at Lucas Oil Speedway in Wheatland, Mo. As the final race in the 2022 points series, Ebert has a shot to win the Kentucky Drag Boat Association Championship.

“I have no plans to hang it up anytime soon," she said. "I hope to have a family and to continue my career at Heartland. But no matter what, I plan to continue racing as long as I can. This is what I love to do.”

This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Meet Wamego native Shelby Ebert, known as 'The Fastest Woman on Water'