Sean, Sorry it was not us. I raced in the late 80,s in a 30 Chris Cat that previously campaigned as Instant Air Freight(Instigator) owned by Gino Montrone and then later purchased by us and run in D class as Wild Turkey. After getting a good deal of seat time in that boat, I knew that I had to have one for pleasure eventually.Hence, the current boat. I guess based on T2x post, I will have to research further what the origin of our current hull is. And the Saga continues!

Attn : Fastcats maybe you guys can jump in on this and shed some additional light on the subject!

The boat you are thinking of was called Wild CAt a 41 Apache cat. David Street drove.Red Crain first throttled then Smitty throttled it. Ther was a 30 foot Flight cat called STRAYCAT that raced in 87 I think. It think the boat was the Sheer Terror boat from the early 80's

In a 1992 Powerboat Mag test on the AO 31, I read that American Offshore had purchased the molds for the Chris Cat in 1989 and produced the first AO for sale in 1990. I assume that the Awesome is the old Shadow hull, as I have had my 1985 Chris Cat rafted up beside an Awesome Cat (which was an old race boat). Both cats looked similar side by side but were quite different. The Awesome almost seemed smaller as it's sides were lower than my Chris Cat at rest in the water, yet the Awesome had bravos and I had the weight of transmissions and #2 speedmasters. Awsome opted to keep a similar 2 tier dash layout (which I personally think looks better than the flat dash of todays AO. Sure the overall design of both are a bit dated and maybe the bottom could use some tweaking but I happen to like the classic offshore look! I think if either are ever changed that they should still offer the classic look as an option. If they could massage the disign like Porche did the 911 and yet still be unmistakebly a 911 they might have something, hey, after all some classic designs still sell. Look what ford did to the T-bird. .

I stand corrected on the stray cat post but for the Sheer cat ??? call Bobby Sheer at Sheer Performance Marine in Ft Lauderdale next to Chief Engines. I believe his number is listed in the 411 directory. Contact me if you need it.

Sean

straycats-I went for a ride in the old instant air raceboat last labor day weekend in LOTO. boat has been converted to semi-pleasure boat but still has aluminum dash and three seats across the front. we ran well over 100mph between the old grand glaize bridge and the new toll bridge in the snottiest water i've seen. broke a tranny when we had a bad reentry off a wave. fun ride!!!!

From everything that I have been told by Ed, (the previous owner) and George, American bought the Chris molds and Awesome ended up with the Shadows. Both, today are still very strong runners. The American Offshore (Chris Cat) is an extremely fast and stable hull at speed and maintains and extremely good ride compared to others in its class. (see American Offshore forums, "burnin down a Skater", sorry T2x, maybe they just got lucky, huh? ) hp vs hp they are still one of the fastest out there.

OK now the AO answer is in straight from the source. Lastly I guess a call to Jim@ Awesome will resolve the Shadow/Awesome question? Maybe they have the 2nd mold from Ciasulli?

I talked to Chris, Tims brother last week and he was looking at at new AO and also found a very clean used one that he made a bid on.

I really was kidding T2x, every dog has his day! LOL

Bleek, That Instant Air was a great running boat. When we ran it it had about 750 hp each side with trannies ,jack shafts out to #3 drives. The boat was amazing. A guy named Mike had bought it from us and converted it back to pleasure with even more power!It was named Summer Madness. The boat ran over 120 from what i remember. If that hull could only talkl!

Fastcats, The Ao is a great ride also. Many times ran side by side in the ocean with it . It may be an old design, but still runs with the best!