El Boss
 

Anyone know if the 30' Shadow cat EL BOSS is still around?

Your going to fake alot of people out with that title, including me!
I thought it was about THE El Boss.

THE El Boss was the 30 foot Shadow Cat....

The Cigarette never won a World Championship, nor set a course record.

Now to the question at hand.... The last time I saw the El Boss/Shadow Pete Hidalgo owned it..... and called it "American Dream" or something like that..... This was before he went away to "camp" for various things...

T2x

I know a little......

See the REAL El Boss below.....

T2x;)

Cash...T2x and George Linder were Shadow Cats....:D

T2x,

The Cigarette won the Worlds in the Sport Class in 1981.

Don't mess with Darren and racing facts. T2x, I guess you stand corrected!

American Dream. I guess it was for him until the "camp counselors" came along.

Looks like you missed one there T2X. Musta been too focused on "the question at hand........"

damn t2x...looks like you've been schooled :) :)

I liked em all...

He certainly had the right "taste" in boats!

Many have come through AYB in Point Pleasant for paint work...
The guy's name is Frank that handles the glass & paint work.

I was just checking to see if you were paying attention.......

Now which hull went around the course faster????


T2x........

Darren has been "schoolin" me for years...... sometimes the father teaches the son...... sometimes the son teaches the father.

see www.darrensoffshorephotos.com..... I'm a big fan of his Dad......;) ;) ;)

T2x.......... proud of his "hero" as always

Yes Bobby rigged it.... I have no idea what the George Linder designer award is...... and George is my best friend.... It's probably something he put together with his PR people.

The story...... Willie ran in a race off Fort Lauderdale, that I was in. Both of us were in Sport class...he in the Eickert, injected aluminum small block/ Cig.... me in a Prototype Shadow Cat with Mercury T-4 outboards/ Wayne "quicker" Vickers on throttles. The flag dropped and Willie accelerated away from the field.... then he looked to his right..and saw Wayne and I checking his top speed..... right next to him. We ran along like this for a mile or two matching his every effort to gain speed...until we got bored and roared off to tear up the Open Fleet.....

Shortly thereafter, Willie bought a Cougar cat, and found that it was too heavy..... He rigged it any way..and it was slightly faster than his Cigarette (low 80's). He got angry and had Bobby Saccenti (his rigger) call me and order a Shadow.

Willie jumped on the phone and asked what it would weigh, bare hull.... I said "maybe 3000/3500 lbs...depending" ."

We delivered the boat and it weighed maybe 3500 lbs..... close to the Cougar's weight..... Willie was furious and called me...demanding another boat. I said "go ahead and rig that one"..... It'll run 115 as is" (faster than anything else in race trim at the time in any class). He said (and I'll never forget these words).... "It better bro....or I'll burn it...in your driveway".

He rigged it......it went 118 ...first time it hit the water in New Orleans...... and he and I became pretty good amigos..after that.

To this day...El Boss was the most exciting Shadow Cat of all. Black Duck was the winningest, and Love It was the most fun.

T2x

Where are these Shadow cats now and who builds them today? How many times were they 'splashed'?

As a matter of fact , i named our race boat EL DIABLO with the EL BOSS in mind !!! Got to love the old them good old days !!!! :hothead:

Do you think he actually would HAVE BURNED IT IN YOUR DRIVEWAY if it hadn't run at least 115mph??? :eek: :confused:

Thank you T2x! I did not feel like taking this to the Betacam... BALDY!.................BALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL LLRIGHT!;)

I remember watching El Boss AND later American Dream by then had canopies. that boat ran its butt off. With small blocks no less! The feds always seem a little interested in those boys. My buddie whent to an Fed auction and bought an old seahawk cougar, Boy the 80s were some interesting times. Hey where is Sal?:D

Jerrry and Willie ran Love it Again. Both good friends of mine. Jerry is getting ready to "graduate" Fast boats and fast times. NO o/b ever outran "el Boss" unless it was broke or sittin on a trailer. "el Boss did out run the open fleet in Ft. Lauderdale in the early eighties. I know because I was in one of them.

Stan

Popeyes O.R.T.

You better believe that Willie would have burned the boat in T2X's driveway!!!

When we sold him a Chris Cat he told Dick Genth (President of Chris Craft) he would park the boat in his living room if it didn't meet expecitiations.

To put the performance of El Boss in perspective in the 80's Open boats started at least 5 minutes ahead of Sport class and Willie and El Boss would catch and pass the entire open fleet within one lap. After several such embarassing races for the Open class boats the APBA changed the courses for Sport and Open class so this could not happen.

The rigging was by Bob Saccenti and was flawless, the engines (small blocks) by Kieth Eickert and nothing could touch them.

Willie Diaz was the most fearless and daring throttleman I have ever seen. He eventually broke the first El Boss defeating the best V hulls in 6-8 foot seas off Miami and T2X built him another one.

Darren has the video file tapes of these exploits and they must be seen to be believed. Hope he does a DVD.

George Linder

Just to clarify Willie Falcon was in Seahawk . My bad it was Benny and Jerry in Luv It Again. Blinky and Joe

were team "members".

Stan

Sals son just got sentenced to five years for money laundering three weeks ago. Sal is also in "school"

Stan

El Boss Apache 33' Race Boat...
 

Was rigged by Bobby Saccenti & used for a very short time. It was derigged completely and sold. They were a narrow beam, tall-sided sportdeck model that had an extremely high deadrise entry forward that "hunted" or bow-steered excessively. Dangerous at speed. This same boat was built as a center-console(not to be confused with the wide-beam(9' 6") center-console that Bobby built) as sterndrive models. By the way, Bobby sold the wide-beam center-console Apache molds to Joe Clawges who owns Sundance Marine in Ft. Lauderdale, Fl. & built one triple Mercury outboard boat that took over 2 years to sell, despite showcasing it center-stage at his marina. Approximately 6-8 of the narrow beam fish boats were built, total. The molds were never used again. Most of the center console boats mysteriously disappeared. Don't know why. Hope this adds to your "Go-Fast History" data banks. Ed;)

George is right Willie was and is one of the top five all time greats. Also one of the greatest guys I,ve ever had the pleasure to call my "friend"

Stan

Hey GJL,

I'ts nice to see that you have joined the group, after so many years sitting on the sidelines. :p Welcome back!:)

First off, I love threads like this! First hand information from the designers, builders and racers.
My only question is where did Shadow (Image Boats) go? With hulls designs years ahead of any competition, and successful raceboats dominating the circut, what happened? Shadow seemed to disappear as quickly as they came out?
Thanks for your response!
Bob G.

:rolleyes: Hahhhhhhh! The Shadow. :rolleyes:

Hi George!, Hi Darren
 

I think we should call Darren "Quick Draw" he is "Fast and deadly accurate" Miller, the 80's were very interesting. Does anyone remember the year we almost didn't have a World Championship? The DEA decided that instead of running all over the country trying to arrest people, they would just wait until the beginning of the Worlds,come to Key West and arrest everyone all at once. That's right, i forgot the "Prince" owned the boat also.

Philip

Philip,
I was in Kew West for the Worlds (1983/4?) and remember the DEA shutting down Kew West airport after the races for "undisclosed reasons". Many racers had to drive to Miami airport to return home. We never heard what the official reason was fro shutting down the airport.

Philip, where have you been? How are you and Kim?

Hi Miller
 

Hi Miller, I have been right here on OSO. lurking mostly, always enjoying the show. The tragedy that took our dear friend Dennis Cavanaugh is still very fresh in my mind. Kim and I are doing fine, thank you for asking. Got to do some boating this summer, T2x and I got together a few weekends. I had some engine trouble in the middle of Aug. hopefully it will get fixed soon. I try to follow any thread that T2x contributes to, I stood up and took notice when I saw George Linder and Darren both on this thread. Lets try to keep GJL posting, I hope we can keep him interested. T2x and George always made a great team.

Robert, I think you are right, in either 83 or 84 there was a major snag at the Airport after the last race, and most people flying out got stuck, most had to rent a car to get to Miami and another flight, but I think that was about an airline ceasing operations without any warning. either Peoples or Braniff, When the DEA tried to put an end to the fun at the worlds I don't think it closed the Airport. The event I am refering to was maybe 85 or so. When the DEA got through there weren't many boats left racing. I think Stan was there. I think T2x was also there.Most of the guys that I know were there are not able to post to this or any other thread.

Philip

Hi Stan:

I beg to differ...The outboard "Shadow Cat" outran the El Boss Cigarette on not one, but two occasions. The first in the Holiday Isles race at Fort Lauderdale...the second at the World's the same year...... "Shadow Cat"
was fast qualifier in the prelims but we broke in the final...

That Shadow with T-4's ran in the mid 90's...the Sport vees, including El Boss ran in the low 80's.

You ought to remember the T-4's...Al Copeland ran them the following year with Billy Sirois on the triple Outboard Maelstrom Open Cat....at Detroit.

T2x......AKA Rich Luhrs

Hi Bob:

The story is embedded in the "Great moments in Cat history" thread........ Basically, we (Shadow/Image)had a partnership split that ended in a lawsuit.... The result George was able to take the designs to Chris Craft, I got some money, I burned the 36' Shadow Cat plug, Elbie took the molds and partnered up with various souls who never figured out how to build aanother Shadow correctly...or on time...and we (George, Ken Adams and I) started Conquest Marine, for the express purpose of building custom one-off wood fibreglass composite hulls (i.e. Rolling Thunder...Jesse James) immediately after.

T2x

T2x

Wow
 

T2X, George Linder and others on the same thread.

Keep it coming!!

Wannabe

Why did you do that?

I personally considered your burning of the 36' Shadow cat plug your most intelligent offshore move!

AB

T2X,
Thanks for the reply, it's always better to hear it from the horse's mouth.
Bob G.

Greatest Cat thread

Just in case you missed it the first time around.

Because I used to have quite a temper.......... Now, I'm the loveable T2x.

T2x

Which translated means..... "he did a lot of dumb things....but THAT was really dumb."

Brownie: From your stand point....It was a great move... think of all the aluminum Cougars you got to sell as a result....don't even mention the boost it gave to Peter Hledin....... I think you both should send me a check
:p :p

T2x