Re: back in the dayss
 

Hey Ron,
I think the picture of "Top Banana" #666 was after Charlie sold the boat to Dirk Patricia(sp?)....who had to raced "Hells Banana" M-666.This thread is bringing back some great memories.Charlie can you confirm this?

Re: back in the dayss
 

S-89 Mary-K is now "Wazzup".

Re: back in the dayss
 

Oops, didn't realized you posted that "Mary-K "is now "Wazzup" Ron.

Re: back in the dayss
 

Those were the good ole days for many reasons, big boat counts, longer offshore courses, cruder technology, flashier (drug & chicken money) teams, real larger than life stuff. However, I feel the reason the sport had more glamor in those days was because only racers had race boats. A fast pleasure boat back then was a Donzi or a Sea Ray with a 188 v8. NOBODY had a 100mph Cigarette as a pleasure boat. In fact, none of the race boats ever saw 100 - other than a few cats.

Now, the WOW factor of the boats is no where near what it was then. That's something that can never be brought back. It was just a special moment in time that can't be duplicated.

Re: back in the dayss
 

Don't Stop I Have A Chubby Good Stuff

Re: back in the dayss
 

Please remember that whenever you see a picture of my old boat with the number 666, know that I was not involved.

The guy that bought the boat company from me, the 24 foot molds that is, not the larger sizes, came back a year later and bought the 38 foot race boat too.

He was supposed to change the name, color scheme and number.....as you can see he did change the number and he painted over the yellow boot stripe with a green color. Same thing happened to Sandy Satullo when he sold Copper Kettle.

My sales agreement with him limited me to a one year time period where I could not use the name banana again. By the time he bought the race boat that time period had already passed and I was going to use the name on a new race boat.

Re: back in the dayss
 

.......and then what happened????

Re: back in the dayss
 

Great Thread!
Thanks!

Re: back in the dayss
 

The year before I had competed with the Government of Puerto Rico sponsoring my boat as Rums of Puerto Rico.....the arrangement was about 25K per race and it was still short of what was really needed.

Betty had just signed up with Bernie Little to run her boat under the Budweiser sponsorship and the era of the cats was really coming of age...meaning, you now had to have two boats at each race.

So, some of the guys started auto racing. Preston Henn had left a couple of years before and I visited with him and Sandy Satullo at the Miami IMSA race. It looked like fun and my oldest son was getting at the age where he was looking for a sport to get into.

IMSA endurance racing was something that as a father and son we could share. I had become good friends with Jochen Mass the Formula 1 driver who now drove for Porsche. My son and I visited with him at Sebring that year and before I knew it, we were in. We did that for a few years and by then, the 4 engine superboats were the rage.

I remember a conversation that I had with Betty on the dock after the Bacardi race in Miami in 1979. She had won the race and I came in third and that left us tied for first place points.

This was the first race that she brought both boats to, the cat and the deep v. I said that I understood why she was doing that, and if I could have afforded to do it I might also. However, I felt that if the sport continued on that path, it would end up with just a different version of Unlimited Hydroplane racing. The owners would be so concerned about the fragile construction of their very fast boats, they would not want to go really offshore anymore.

My son talked me into attending the races this year in Key West after an abscence of many years. Standing on the pier and watching the whole race from that one vantage point, my own words came back to me, that what I thought might happen actually did. This point was reinforced when I began to see boats coming back to the ramp with damage to them from these rather calm waters.

This is not a criticism of the racers.....I feel racers will race in any conditions, anywhere, racers are not the ones who set the venues, sponsors, manufacturers and politics are.

This is just my own personal observations of where the sport that I used to know so well has evolved to. I don't mean to offend anyone, it is just a different sport from what I was used to.

Re: back in the dayss
 

No doubt times have changed. What was the top speed for an open class boat back then?

Re: back in the dayss
 

You have to remember that state of the art was a Nordskog speedometer that hung down at the transom. The accuracy of GPS wasn't even dreamt about.

All we have are the average speeds to look back on for the various races and they are skewed due to the courses being in the open ocean, ie currents, tides etc.

By that I mean, that a race from Miami to the Bahamas was not the straight line it is on a chart. You could always tell the new guys....they would come out of Government Cut and head straight out. The old guys, would turn south to pick up the Gulf Stream that flowed north and ride it across....that way when you got across, you were about where you wanted to be and you could see all the new guys boats coming back down from the north because they had gone too far.

A good example of speeds would be the Bahamas 200, which was actually 205 miles long. Jerry Jacoby in Ajac Hawk and I were dueling side by side over the last 25 mile run from Bimini to Freeport. One of my my engines let go and he went on to win. We came second by 30 seconds. For the entire race they gave us an average speed of over 83 MPH.

Now the interesting fact about this is that the seas were so big the day before a lot of us filled our fuel tanks....total about 550 gallons. Race day was not as rough and we had set ups to pump over the side to dump the extra fuel (sorry, not politically correct) My pumps jammed and we finished the race with over 160 gallons still on board...about 960 lbs.

The best speed I ever saw on my boat, a 38 foot deep v, was about mid 90's with a very light fuel load. So the cats, once they were straightened out and working correctly had to be over 100 in the right conditions.

Re: back in the dayss
 

With all due respect....offshore racing and marathon racing had the same roots...and many of the boats were much smaller back in the day.....(George Linder and I ran in the original Hennesy Around Long Island races in 18' Eltros)...the first successful offshore cats were way before Souter and Jones started mucking around with the big stuff. Here's Johnny Bakos and Odell Lewis , two legendery offshore pioneers, in a typical Powercat. Boats like these and early Ted Jones cats raced offshore in the late 50's and early 60's.

T2x

Re: back in the dayss
 

FYI.........I ran Powercats in 1963 and 1964

T2x

Re: back in the dayss
 

FYI....The Shadows hit the race course at least a year before the sleek Arneson Cougar.

T2x

Re: back in the dayss
 

How about this one....typical Mercury team boat when the team went offshore racing.


Photo courtesy of Mark 75H

T2x

Re: back in the dayss
 

T2x....sorry, I should have been more specific.....inboard or sterndrive cats I was talking about.

If you go back to the era you are speaking about, then you can remember the Gold Coast Marathon from Miami to Palm Beach inside on the intracoastal with the Switzer cat wings. Also many Power Cat outboards.

Also the early Power Cat outboards with Chuck Mercereau (spelling?) who not only ran ocean and marathons but he ran the inside passage up to Alaska.

Even Walt Walters designed a 20 foot cat outboard long before Maui Kai for Tom Sopwith in England. He raced it in the Cornish 100. That was used for a lot of the research for Maui Kai.

Many cat innovations that ran both outboard and inboard set ups at the Salton Sea and Parker 9 hour races I did not include as it was not offshore.

If we want to go way back, Gar Wood had a big cat that he used for a cruiser and he ran it offshore.

Re: back in the dayss
 

can't let it die :drink:

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Boat # 70 I believe was powered y a turbine run by Odel Lewis

Re: back in the dayss
 

Remember Ghost Rider????

Any old stories?

Re: back in the dayss
 

more Needle Nose... :cool:

Re: back in the dayss
 

Ron

Ghost Rider was owned by Hugh Doyle and designed by Walt Walters and Jim Wynne. Jim was the driver who became world champion driving it in 1965.

It was 28 feet long and made of wood. Cold molded wood built by Souter of England. It was powered by twin Daytona inboard engines on shafts.

I saw it around the waterfront in Newport RI in the 80's. I understand that someone in NY owns it now.

In one of the races...Cowes Torquay? The co-driver broke his leg on reentry and finished the race sitting down wedged in the corner of the cockpit.

He passed the time by counting between liftoff from the top of one wave to renentry again. He said he almost got to 5 seconds on more than one wave. As you can see from the photos no trim tabs were used then.

Remember, this was an era of no bolsters.....the racers just stood in an open cockpit and held on to the wheel or grab bars.

Re: back in the dayss
 

I saw "Top Banana" on the rear quarter of one of the Nextel Cup cars for the Bud Shootout. Is there any conection?

Re: back in the dayss
 

Another Merc Team boat..... a Memco....can you say "In the Gulfstream"?

Think about it....somewhere in the Bahamas.....out of sight of land....and just about everything else.

Photo courtesy of the driver.....Steve Sirois... (Bill's brother)

T2x

Re: back in the dayss
 

that photo is great!

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tt

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Damn T2.......... I'm old..... but I was in the 4th grade in 64............ :eek:

Re: back in the dayss
 

I raced while I was in High School.......... I raced from Albany to NY (136 miles) in one of these in 1964.......

15 foot Powercat...engines pictured are 80 hp Merc 800's...we raced twin Merc 1000's....100 hp each....biggest motors made at that time.

By the way in 1964 this was the fastest "pleasure boat" on Long Island...inboard or outboard....

The only things faster were full race Inboard and alky outboard Hydroplanes.

T2x

Re: back in the dayss
 

The guy in the photo is the legendary Chuck Mercereau.....who was a merc team driver and the holder of many records.

T2x

Re: back in the dayss
 

Ghost Rider was purchased by Barry Cohen in the late 60's at about the same time as he started Barcone boats..... He started racing in 1966 out of K&K Outboard on Long Island, where I worked at the time....with a 16 flat bottomed Rayson Craft powered by twin Merc 110's. Roughest riding boat I ever drove. He also had a beautiful Sting Ray which come to think of it may have been the roughest riding car I ever drove.

To my knowledge Barry still has Ghost Rider, although the sightings in Newport could have been him taking a ride.

T2x

Re: back in the dayss
 

I met Barry last year. He's ready to bring her out of mothballs and install new engines whenever another endurance run from Miami to NY is pulled together.

Re: back in the dayss
 

My dad and I saw Barry at the Miami show on Thurs. - yes he does in fact still own Ghost Rider. He is having the engines rebuilt by Merc....

Hey Ron - we looked for you but you had gone already for the day... Hope we get to meet you in person sometime soon.

Re: back in the dayss
 

Chatim,
Why don't you come to the OPA meeting this Saturday at Smitty's Marina in Brick NJ? There is talk of doing a P6 Class for boats under 24'. It would be cool to see one of the Bananas on the course again! I'm sure Ron will also be at the meeting.

Re: back in the dayss
 

Bringing this thread TTT for new OSO member JAdams.
Check out post 138 for a pic of your dad's boat. Post 100 is "Adios Gringo", a 27 Signature.

Re: back in the dayss
 

Anyone know more about this boat? Had to be owned by a futures trader.

Thanks. Great thread.

Re: back in the dayss
 

"Limit Up" was raced by Michael Doxford from England, the boat was a 35 Cigarette, later became "Benihanna"

Re: back in the dayss
 

this sure makes me realize what a pup i am. i dont know chit about the history of this sport, thought i did,, i love thses threads !!!

thanks

Re: back in the dayss
 

bringing this one ttt guys - I can't get enough of it . . . who has photos of Aronow's original Cigarette? I know there has to be someone in Miami that snapped some shots way back :drink:

Harry

Re: back in the dayss
 

The boat pictured is a 35 Cigarette running in the Key West race in 1976.

Michael Doxford was a commodity broker from London who raced all over the world. He and co-driver Tim Powell raced both 35 and 40 foot Cigarettes.

As a team they won 9 races in the the '77 season, most of them in far away places like South Africa and South America.

Those guys had a great way of travelling too. At the '78 race in Mar Del Plata, we all flew into Buenos Aires first and then flew down to Mar Del Plata on smaller planes.

Limit Up and company came into Buenos Aires on the Concorde from Europe no less.

There is a great shot of this 35 in a race somewhere, the angle of the shot makes it look like it is jumping over the actual spectator fleet.

Boby Davis of B&C had it hanging in his shop for a while, maybe someone else has a copy out there. It is one of the all time best offshore photos.

Someone else said they thought this was the Old Benihana boat, it was not. I am the present owner of the old Benihana 35 Cigarette. It was the 6th 35 footer ever made and began it's racing life as Spirit with Hal Sahlman.

Re: back in the dayss
 

Stinger, does this look familiar? I finally found it. That's me and my sister a long, long time ago.

Re: back in the dayss
 

PRETTY BOATS & FAST WOMEN[/B][/B][/QUOTE]

This was on Howard Quam's #45 "FlapJack".
Keith Hazell was his throttleman until the end of 1979.
"FlapJack" was a 38' Bertram in Kevlar that year.

Howard and Keith are both gone now.