my view from the coarse
 

Jeff is right is was rough in Miami.Not sure what he means by we checked out as usual since we were first to the first and second pin. In fact we have been first to the pin every time we have raced JBS. When JBS turned tight at turn two they got under us as you would expect. Given the cross sea conditions turning hard put tremendous load on the right sponson. The turbine engines torque far exeeds what any offshore gas engine to date can deliver making the situation that much worse. Lastly JBS set up there boat with alot of led in the bow which caused the boat to ride nose down increasing the pounding and stress to the sponson's. When JBS decided to pick up the pace a bit I decided to play the game of attrition and run our boat at the speed I thought it would survive the conditions. Obviously anyone in the know would realize neither boat was running any where near its top speed.

The Miami race conditions coupled with the uncomparable horse power in our hands could have caused any hull to fail if pounded both in the corners and in the straight aways for 12 laps. I am sincerley sorry for the financial loss JBS experienced and in no way feel they deserved to find out the boats limits in this way. I am sure they will find a way to get back out there and I look forward to a better day on the race coarse when we can have a trouble free day of head to head racing.

I hope JBS can take some responsability for the damage the way I did when I rolled our boat in Key West . My unwillingness to slow down more than I did knowing I had no ability to trim the boat properly since I lost a trim pump half way to the first pin can not be blamed on my driver or the rigger since the throttleman sets the pace and is ultimately responsable for finishing the race in all cases. In short the throttleman must keep the boat together to win. Miami was not the race to see who had the faster boat rather the day to see who could find the right speed and set up to keep the boat together and win. In Panama City last year I faced off with Geico and Budweiser and got a bad start as a result , I put the throttles down and caught them but in the process destroyed both drives at the begginning of the second lap due to my unwillingness to pace myself and keep it together.

For the record average lap speeds and top speeds in Miami were close with the greatest difference being 8 miles per hour in the second lap which is when the JBS boat began to come apart. Hydraulic water pressure will delaminate any hull if allowed to continue entering the hull. This is why they now use high pressure water to cut steel.

I have faith in the mystic hull but also realize we are experimenting with more power than any offshore hull maker has experience designing for under race conditions. Turbine Marine's powertrain will wow anyone who has not experienced it and destroy any hull if not respected.

Rick Merola/Throttlman-Aquamania G3

Very well spoken.........

Very well spoken Aquamania. I do not like to use the term checked out against the guys who I race against or read it from other teams. In this small circuit it can bight you in the ass any given day. To win you must finish first. Been there done that !

Guys,

Whats done is done. Joey put it best, "hindsight is 20/20" Any racer that has any kind of experience, yes has had plenty of success, but I am sure plenty of mistakes. One of the tricks to life is to make a mistake, just dont make it twice. In offshore racing as well as society we always want to play the blame game and unfortunatly, a lot of people want to point fingers instead of assuming responsibility. There is no blame here, it happened, now its over. Why dont we turn this into a productive thread and ask how all of us can help JBS get back on the course to race another day.

Today was the most monumental day in offshore racing history, with the announcement of NETWORK television and here we are acting like children. One of the associations now has given us a tool in order to make offshore racing what we all feel it should be and that is what we as teams need to capitalize on instead of beating a dead horse.

Jeff/ Joey whatever you need from me or my team, let us know, as for everyone else, lets get together on the same page and go forward and put this incident behind us. Lets take the birthday present that SBI has given us and make offshore what it should be.

Trent
TnT Racing

Jbs
 

I'm so disappointed.JBS racing has always provided for all the teams at the races wether it be fixing other teams outdrives,vinyling boats,lending batteries,or providing a place to to to the bathroom or change.I even let Aqua Mania use my fueling truck in key west.we've always done that without hesitation.seeing my dream vanish in the blink of an eye has been devistating for me and my team.if anyone has any idea how to help us it would be great.

Obviously everyone here at Mystic is devastated by what happened with one of our boats last weekend. As I have stated before we take great pride in what we build and work very hard at it. This boat did have a problem in Key West that was repaired but showed back up in Miami and unfortunately grew into a much larger issue.

In a meeting on Monday morning with Jeff and Joe from JBS I personally made an offer to take the hull with the issues back and put them in a brand new x brace structure hull which i have in stock so they can continue their season as uninterrupted as possible. JBS was the only boat that was built without it and NONE of the other boats have had structural problems. The pickle fork that came off Longlite then Geico I knocked off myself in Ocean City last year was a removable pickle fork which is not done on any of the boats any more.

I am standing behind my product now and i always will. I have the best racers in the US in my hulls and there is a reason for that. I certainly don't want to see this forum dissolve into some petty pissing match over my product.

Best

John Cosker
President
Mystic Powerboats Inc.

John you are a class act and have always been that way,that is what I call taking care of your customers and then some.

I think it would be prudent to close this thread.

All 3 parties have voiced their thoughts. Anything additional should be kept private.

Julie