BROWNIE

Don't be insulted by the title. I think that you 140 mph guys have WAY bigger juevos than we did. What I wanted to discuss was the physical effort to steer the stern drive boats with no power steering. When Bill Wishnick bought Odell's #70 red Bertram 31', it had the first set of #3 speedmasters. No power steering. It had twin RideGuide cable steering, and it took a frickin' gorilla to steer it. I had Nova Marine in those days, and Bobby Moore as Bill's race guy. We took out the Merc steering and put in a truck steering box with a worm gear, but still no power. The average NFL player could not have steered it with one hand, and throttled with the other (Hmm... maybe that's where the throttleman came from...). We all came from inboard boats that a: steered themselves in a straight line, and b: didn't jump as much.

I already considered the aluminum sterndrive an instrument of the devil, and this only strengthened that belief. When Billy and Bob took the now named 'Boss o' Nova' (Get it?) to the Houston channel derby in 1970, they won, but they scared the s**t out of the checkboat at the Texas City dike by going around it 3 times, REALLY FAST! Imagine running that in the Bahamas 500. Those guys were really tough!

Black Tornado

You are right.
Those times were really pioneristic and the man were the MAN!
I like too much those years. And read the story that you know to us.

dammmagnum

Hello Brownie,

Well put.. Was a different time in Offshore racing.
Thank you for your inputs

Jim

24degrees

This would apply to auto racing too.......

Top Banana

And women were women.......don't think Betty was buying this all male perspective on whatever it was..........

Cevert

What you guys didn't figure out, that the NASCAR guys did, was to change the spring rate inside the Delphi boxes. No power steering for them either. Imagine racing around Darlington for 500 miles in the heat of summer.

racesdad

you are right browniie, i have had to steer a boat around with no p/s and it aint for the weak. i bow to all you guys who laid the groundwork for all of us newbies, ( even after 20 years ).
thanks to all of you real racers

priceb

I will always wonder how Betty Cook was physically strong enought to race offshore powerboats and endure 200 + miles of rough water conditions

racesdad

cause she was a bada ss

VintageOffshoreClassic

Brownie,

Very nice write up, thank you for sharing your experience’s.