Captain Crooks funeral on Wednesday

Derek Crooks, one of this country’s top powerboat racers, succumbed to cancer early last Friday morning, at age 49.  A BWIA International pilot since 1976, he ended his flying career as Captain of the MD 83 aircraft.  Captain Crooks, who  had been fighting the disease for the past three years, leaves his wife, Jeanie, and children Andrew, Victoria and Nicholas. A powerboat driver since 1978, Crooks won the Great Race between Trinidad and Tobago a total of eight times, starting from 1978, when  together with his late brother, Brian, they piloted  the winner “Checkmate” in a record time of one hour 13 minutes.  This record still stands as that course was changed soon after.

By 1994, in a re-designed Checkmate the two Crooks brothers and Carlos Sabga, became the first national team to win an International Championship at the Winston Offshore Championships in Puerto Rico. The Puerto Rican championship was divided into five races throughout that year. Checkmate won three times and placed second twice. Crooks (B) was awarded the Throttleman of the Year  In 1995, the trio won the Great Race establishing a record of one hour four minutes on a new course, which still stands to date. That same year Checkmate was burnt in a Puerto Rican boat yard, and on their return to Trinidad, the crew started re-converting a Bowen boat “Top Gun” into a new “Checkmate.” In 1997, Brian Crooks died tragically in a plane crash off St Vincent while returning from a one-day West Indies cricket match. Crooks (D) and Sabga with replacement Robin Geofroy, raced with Brian’s ashes and won the Great Race. Derek’s last race in 1998 ended around Grande Riviere when Sabga fractured a vertebrae. The funeral of the late Captain Derek Crooks takes place on Wednesday at 10 am at the Assumption Roman Catholic Church, Long Circular Road, followed by private cremation.