When the Cougar cats were made of wood

[Black Tornado]

Michael Doxford came back to a cat in 1980 with this 38' Cougar: the yellow Limit Up.
That cat opened a new era of..."rationalism"...compact engines bay and immediatly forward the compact cockpit.
In 1981 Doxford choosing the Jaguar turbo tried to opposing the V8 egemonia without success because a delamination of the hull during the Needles Trophy.

[Black Tornado]

Then the cat was sold to Ted Toleman as third cat of him collection,with the return to the V8 rigged and throttled by Harold Smith.
Toleman won a race in 1983 at Venice.
After three years the boat was a new entry in the Tom Gentry fleet. The Hawajian modified the cat cutting the cockpits shields and putting the position of the crew like on a F1 and putting two Gentry Turbo Eagle engines.
In the first race of the World Championships in Auckland 1986 the cat was very impressive, winning easy and deceiving all the peoples that the Title was only a Gentry affair.
Gentry instead lost the last two races anonymously and the World Title gone to another cat but five feet shortly and with 500 hp less:the Gioffredi's Mededil ,a Buzzi design with Aifo Turbo Diesel.

[Black Tornado]

Backing briefly to the Class 2,in 1980 appeared the Gus It a 25' with a pair of Mercury for Robin Culpan.
Again a cat with central(longitudinally and trasversally)cockpit and the outboards clinging at the wing.
Picture from the Graham's Library on Boatmad.

[Black Tornado]

1981 was a prolific year about the builded cat from Cougar and the innovation launched on the stern of one of them.
Arneson Drive was two cats builded with Philippinian teak,strong and light playwood,for Howard Arneson that was famous for the unusual stern drives that came out the stern of him Scarab 38' Sea Sweep some years before.
The joint venture of cats Cougar and the Arneson Surface Drives will be the top winning in eighties. The superpowered KS&W V8 made the rest for Tony Garcia and Tom Gentry in 1983.
First photo from the Cats section on HORBA website.

[Black Tornado]

Always in 1981 Meynard drove a 35' that blasted during he was duelling with Garcia's Arneson Drive in a race in 1981.
Note the extreme profile of the sponsons and the innovative tunnel extention between the Arneson Surface Stern Drives and the cockpit very aft.

[ViciousOne]

Here is a old woody that we are revamping for pleasure use, I know it is not a couger but still a neat old boat it is the first boat to have V/12 lambo's in it.


Spark

[ViciousOne]

Acouple more.

[littlenige]

Spark any chance of making the pics bigger? Is that the old Rocky Conquest cat?

[Rik]

Originally Posted by Black Tornado

1981 was a prolific year about the builded cat from Cougar and the innovation launched on the stern of one of them.
Arneson Drive was two cats builded with Philippinian teak,strong and light playwood,for Howard Arneson that was famous for the unusual stern drives that came out the stern of him Scarab 38' Sea Sweep some years before.
The joint venture of cats Cougar and the Arneson Surface Drives will be the top winning in eighties. The superpowered KS&W V8 made the rest for Tony Garcia and Tom Gentry in 1983.
First photo from the Cats section on HORBA website.

Funny how the history of these boats was lightly talked about on the "History of Cats" thread.

The Cougars were DOMINATE back then.

[ViciousOne]

littlenige, It is the old rocky boat, I'll see if I can change up the pic's.