Can you post some pic`s of your boat for us to see.


Mike

Boy am I glad I was the one who saved Tommy Sopwith's THUNDERBOLT, she must be the rarest Ray Hunt to design to have won an International Powerboat Race, are there any Bertrams out there being restored? where is YO YO Jim Wynns early boat. WHY IS IT NO ONE HAS CLICKED TO THE RARITY VALUE OF THESE EARLY RACERS!
How many more are going to be lost!
Regards to all
Mike James

Hi guys,

I am in Melbourne Australia. Firstly I was talking to a friend of my fathers last week who was mercury marines sales manager in Australia in the 70s/80s. He said he was friends with a guy named Peter Dean who was an offshore racer in the 70's and moved to the usa. He told me he manufactured cigarette boats here...his boat was called slingshot I think. I wonder what ever happened to his moulds? I also wonder if what he was talking about was a boat from the orginal carey modified? I constantly look here at the offshore boats for sale and I hardly ever see a cigarette for sale. If there are other aussies on this forum and if you know more it would be great to hear from you.

I would also like to know if boats like cigarettes are still raced in Australia.

PriceB

If you are in Melbourne you should get down to a meeting of the Australian Offshore Power Boat Club. Anything you want to know about offshore in Australia, you will find there.

The website is aopc.com.au

Most of the bigger boats are now cats as we don't race in as big water as we used to and the cats are so much faster albeit more likely to bury a nose or break in big water. On the website you will see the boats currently racing.

One of the teams, Smorgon Steel, is owned by Tony Low. He has been around as long as anyone on Australian Offshore and he used to be the Cigarette dealer for Australia until Don's passing. There was even a world championship race in Melbourne many years ago.

I have a boat built from a 36 Cig mold. I do not know if it is from the stretched version of the original 32 but I imagine there are not that many 36 Cig molds in Australia. I am in Sydney ad if you are ever up here you are welcome to come and have a look.

The next offshore race is in Newcastle, but the week after my birthday (last week of December) is a race in Sydney. Grab a cheap Virgin and come on up.

Hi Kubcat,

I looked at the website. the boats are quite different to the old days. the boat I am keen on buying is a 38 top gun. Would it be possible to race a boat like this today? would it be competive and what class would it be raced in? I think they look heaps cooler! I know they can still be raced in the usa

I would like to go to watch the races up north.

What do you do with your cigarette boat? Do you race it or is it for pleasure? What type of power do you have in it and what is the age/condition?

Regards

priceB

Love the name on the back corner of that Cigarette 1 in the picture above

MF Marco, far be it for me to suggest to you what to do with your own boat - but!!!!! If the hull is indeed that of a famous racer and you were still keen on converting it to pleasure, would you consider selling it to someone who would want to restore it as a racer?? Maybe you would consider buying a different hull for pleasure use? Just seems a shame if you have a piece of history to be changing it for pleasure use at a time when there are many out there who are keen to see such boats preserved in their original form............your thoughts?

Hi guys was reading the book again last night,great reference book.
I must chase up the last owner of the OZ "The Cigarette" and see if he still has the motors and gearbox/legs.

As an update to this story since 2007......Michael Aronow has given us some additional information in the years since. Michael and Knocky House were the official transporters for Don's boats in Europe. When the 69 season was coming up, Don decided he was,going for the World Championship again and he had a new boat made. The new boat was a 32 foot built under the brand name Cary. Don had just sold Magnum and wanted to be able to race under a new name, so his friend Elton Cary started a new company and the boat was called a Cary.

Don's plan was to build a few of these boats and position them all over the world. Back then to a be a World Champion, you really had to race all over the world. He built at least 4 of them as Michael remembers. Three of them were lettered up as The Cigarette. That was the name of a famous Rum Runner out of Brooklyn, Don's home town. He named his first race boat from his first boat company the same name....that was a 233 Formula with a single engine. Bob Di Nisco owns this boat and has perfectly restored it and we ran it in the 2008 Race to Bimini in Don's honor.

The fourth boat was sold to Peter Rothschild and was donated to HORBA a few years back. We are still gathering period pieces and money to begin the restoration. As far as we know that is the only remaining race boat out of the 32 Cary molds that Don built and tested himself. That boat was campaigned as Thunderball.

Very cool! Thanks for the update