Move the throttle lever, and ­Mercury Racing’s 500R outboard crushes you into the seat or bolster. There’s torque to spare all the way to its max-rated 6,600 rpm. It proved a blast testing aboard ...

If you’re not big into boating, you might think of outboard motors as weedy, sputtering engines lumped on the back of tiny fishing dinghies. In reality, they’re just as often horsepower monsters ...