Richie
That Red Vengeance(probably) it under restoration in Italy now.
The Aeromarine IX was a new builded boat or a former something powered with MerCruisers?

Out of context again!!!!!!!!!!

NEW !!!!!!!!!!!

Richie,
On the issue in 1972 and the new engines with open-chamber heads at the CTC, how was it technically solved enabling you to race? I assume the "legally" old engines had closed chamber head with as high compression, so did you change the pistons as well or the whole setup?

Joern

Good evening Marco.
We will have to agree to disagree on that one. Although I am extremely admirative of "Lady Nara's" victory in the 1971 Cowes-Torquay-Cowes, I do not place it in the same bracket.
For a start, lady nara was well down on other competitors who fell by the wayside as the race progressed through hurricane wind conditions. In all fairness, the red cigarette hull wasn't the fastest on the day. However, as I said I am in awe of the courage displayed by Bonelli and Statua, both injuried in a freak accident and saved from worse fate by a quick thinking Attilio Petroni.

My first contact with offshore was to witness the arrival of Avenger 007 for the 1970 Deauville Trophy on the back of the team truck. The rest, as they say is history. I was hooked for life.

Now to conclude, here is a photo of Black Tornado, which I hope is new to you. If it is, do pass it on to the Tornado website if you wish.
I can understand your dedication to Vincenzo Balestrieri who should be in the "Offshore Racing Hall of Fame" if there was one.
However, you must understand that the incident of the 73 Dauphin d'Or was,let's say, 'unfortunate' but like the philosopher Seneca said:" there is no great genius without a touch of madness"
For Richie who was a the receiving end it is bound to have cast a shadow on his appreciation of the individual. We need / must repect his point of view, even if it differs from what you would like to hear or read about a favorite of yours.
As one forum user said, let's concentrate on our commun interest rather than on our differences.

I wish you a nice Christmas.
Phil.

Thank you Richie, you are welcome. The last words of your message mean a lot to me.
Merry Christmas to you and yours.

Phil.

Just had new member join HORBA today........ and he has the old 36 foot Cigarette Slap Shot, that he is getting ready to race in the 2007 season.

I invited him to the old boat get together the last weekend in April in South Florida.

www.historicraceboats.com

where in south hl will this be ?

Mike

Joern: Remember I said volumes about that CTC race, well here goes, I`ll try to condense it. one of The differences between the open chamber head and the closed chamber obvious was the open chamber ran what we used to call the peanut spark plugs, they were much smaller than the closed chamber plugs. Knocky House who was rautboards throttleman ( one of the great great legends ) was aware of this. Anyway when we went through Scrutinizing, which if you have never done it, it is something to behold and experience. Upon completeion they told us there was a problem, and they would let us know what it was later in the day, I had a gut feeling what was comming, and sure enough we were disqualified at 4:00 in the afternoon, Nocky was happy as was evryone who had to race against us, they had eliminated us. Anticipating what was going down, I made some calls to friends at Mercury in Poole @ the Merc. distributor. Guess what???, he had four closed chamber cylinder heads that had been on the shelf for sometime and we could buy them, Bonomi sent his plane to fetch them, and I as chief mechanic started stripping the open chambers off to replace with closed coming from Poole, I was disassembling on the trailer going to the airport for the Avgas. Long story short!!! the heads arrived, on the boxes was the name Billy Martin special. I worked all night, no sleep, the sun came up we rolled out of Goves and Gutteridge to scrutineering, where we passed, and were allowed to race. Bonomi was filling me with sugar pills and coffee to keep me awake, I threw on my uniform jumped in the boat, did one quick test run, then went to starting line, 10 min. into the race we blew the belts of the rear engine, I had forgotten to shim the alternator, so belts ran off line, Fortunatly I always had belts ty-wrapped behind, so I went back and put new belts on, and tightened the hell out of them. Only took maybe 10 min. by now the adrenaline was kicking in and we basically kicked evryones ass and one. Jack Stuteville said he never saw a boat run that good in rough water, said it looked like a rocket. WE WON!!!!!! take that all of you. It`s all about dedication, preparation and not
giving up that makes a Champion. I want to clarify something also that many did not know, but the fact of the Martini sponsorship. They only supplied cloths, uniforms, and paint work on the boats. If they gave $25,000 per year it was a lot. Ceasar Fiorio hooked it all up, and was there to make us look like pro`s. Bonomi paid all the bills, as I was the one who wrote the checks, Sorry to burst any bubbles, but that was the way Offshore was then. It was the same with Ippolitto and Bernie Little, very little money but made big ego and scared the others. That`s all for now. 7XCHAMP

Charlie: Happy holidays to you and your family, and keep up the good work. remember slap shot became Tamarind seed with Jack Tachinsky, teamed with Freddie Miller. and Ralph Seavey, Tony Azzara, I remember at one of the Calif. races they dumped it and threw them all in the water while testing. Ralph and I used to be roomates when we worked for ECK in Fond Du Lac He called me afterwards and was shaken up, I think he broke some ribs etc. Ralph passed on as did Tony Azzara, rest in Peace. I`m always there for you, just let me know. Your very good friend Richie AKA 7XCHAMP