Interesting that golf, fishing and auto racing have all been mentioned as boring.
Those three boring(to some) televised events have a huge fan base and millions tune in to watch.

The visibility angle along with some education on whats going on could really help.
Maybe we have to get over our selves and find places to race that provide the best viewing from shore and not the best racing for us. The best people always win anyway.

The Bass Master event at one of our parks was held on a small lake that was split up into areas that each angler had to stay in for a set period of time. This gave the fans on shore the ability to see their favorites up close near shore.
This same small lake could be great to have a race on that we set the marks close to shore.
The course might have to be set poorly so that there is a mark were the people are and hopefully we are screamin reachin to it.
Maybe coordinate the exhibition race to be run during a larger event that lots of people will already be at.

Visibility: Very good addition to the discussion

No disrespect to the crowd working on youth designs.
If Hobie has built 37 1/2 new models for kids since the late 60's with little success, what are you really doing differant. I don't need the answer here as this has discussed at length many times.