The St. Petersburg Pictorials
 

Thursday, October 16, on board Southwest 787, Islip-Tampa. There can only be one reason for the great Bill Mauff sitting in the back of the flying bus: Let’s go racin’ !

And it’s happening this weekend in St. Petersburg, FL.

St. Pete is gearing up to be party-town, U.S.A. for this weekend.

At the moment, the festivities are sedate and civilized.

At the Hooter’s party at the Holiday Inn, the Hooter’s Girls go ga-ga over Mrs. Schleuss Jr.

Just checking. The lady is qualified to work for Hooters.

A new Schleuss offspring appears to be in the mold.

It will be another winning creation by Chris & Randy.

Julie & Matt of Throttle-Up, doing a little friendly customer-relations work.

Super Vee Light stickman Eric Wahlberg and driver Ben Hedrick, of Hedrick Motorsports.

Yeah! Wild Card is in the house.

The biggest nuts with the biggest nuts.

Will Smith, of Phantom, specialist for boats with lids.

Will reports that there is a lot of new interest in his SVL boats, and the class itself.

And the mere thought of Wild Card piloting one of these rockets ….

The Supercat guys always have the biggest toys.

Cool. I await the craziness! :D

hey now!...where's the line start for new props!??!?!

:D :D

..if anyone needs a "lid"...it's those Boyz!!

:crazy: :D

At the drivers meeting, 88 boats answered roll call. A new record.

Racers are very well behaved, they are drinking their ovaltine, and they go to bed early.

Gordo administers a chest exam to Eileen, in anticipation of tomorrow’s physicals.

She passed with flying colors.

Dirty Race Girl graced the racers with her appearance. Not dirty at all. Actually, quite angelic.

Her chest Xrays also came out flawless.

Gordo was his charming self during the evening.

Later in the evening, OSO-Steve had to broach the bad news to his entourage: “I busted the pace boat.”

After Steve had changed an oil filter, the engine committed suicide. These engines do have souls.

Here is me applying for a job at Powerboat Magazine. The request was denied by publisher Victoria Newton.

As a matter of fact, she denied all my requests.

Because of a separate engagement, the actual race was not covered by this here reporter.

OSO Steve, temporarily boatless, promised to deploy his 3ft lens and post a monstrous amount of pictures.

Steve?

While on the topic of lids:

Speaking on deep background, Will of Wild Card confirmed that the team had bought from Will Smith the Phantom that had been for sale for quite some while.

All this baby needs is an engine and a drive, which the Wild Card team will fit in about 30 seconds.

With a roof over their heads, the Wild Maniacs will be unfrikkenbeatable.

Phantom and Wild Card: Where there's a Will, there's a way!

Pictures of the race are in the photos section