Hot Singles ! - Pictures

[WaterZebra]

The Marine Stadium was basically my home race course. I ran countless laps there both in races and testing. If you look at a picture of the Stadium stands you will see that they form a sideways V. The prevailing wind at the Stadium is about a 45 degrees left headwind on the front straight. This causes a pretty big vortex to form in front of the stands. I first witnessed this when red smoke flares were used to stop the 9 Hour race when Hank Bowman was killed. Over the years I noticed most blowovers happened right in front of the stands. I also noticed when I had a boat trimmed just right it would get real light passing the stands especially if you were out in the middle of the lane. Not so bad along the buoys.
In this incident as the boats came down to the start they were close together and swapping air and shuffling sideways even before they got to the stands. It didn't take much in that situation to start the action from there. Harry was the first to go since his boat was already running faster than designed. Then the other two.

I'm surprised they didn't mark this area with some special buoys or relocate the start/finish line? Never did understand why the start/finish had to be mid point on the long straights? I think the thing that we learned over the years was OPC tunnel boats could NEVER be raced like the way open wheel or stock cars could.

[2us70]

Full disclosure. The "vortex theory" is my own. I arrived at it from observation of several episodes where smoke flares were deployed from the start/finish area of the stands and from running a lot of laps there. I am not an aeronautical engineer. I don't even play one on TV.

[FUJIMO]

...great photo kid...

[WaterZebra]

76 was indeed Reggie,575 was Harry Kerslake and 486 was Danny Piggot. Harry's boat was a Baja originally intended to run as a SJ boat. This boat generated way too much lift at U class speeds hence the tunnel flaps in the picture. Harry told me to run into any wind took full down on the flaps and even then the boat would lift straight up level and loose contact with the water. I knew Harry because his own personal ride was an SD boat and we raced many times. I always thought it was funny that Harry ran those two classes at the same time.
I witnessed this accident up close from the rail just past the clock at the Marine Stadium. As the field came down for the start it was pretty plain that something was likely to go wrong. Most of them had got the timing on the clock pretty good and it got pretty crowded. This was the result.

The Baja's ability to lift and stay level "in flight" sounds really frightening. Once you lose lateral stability by the absence of prop thrust or skeg contact? Wow! Sounds like this boat had equal potential to "stuff"?
Spooked me enough to have my boats "crab" to the left or right and it had nothing to do with what I was doing to steer. Absolutely hated clock starts and sprint racing and liked 10 lappers of marathon stuff better where you could work things out rather than deciding the whole thing in turn 1.

I once heard the story of a guy running an SJ at Havasu or Parker who blew over, rotated and landed flat clean and kept on going. Kill switch didn't activate because he never left his seat (pre-capsule days). I also had a guy barrel roll in a turn one complete revolution and kept on going (Capsule boats) He swears it never happened but I watched the whole thing because I was right on his tail and getting ready to pass on the exit pin on the inside lane.

[2us70]

John McCall and I were testing my v-bottom boat and a customers boat at St Petersburg. John was lapping the customers boat and several times it just tried to turn sideways. Happened in both directions. I was behind him and saw it happen. When we got back on our trailers he asked me if I saw what the boat did? I said that I had seen it so he then asked me what I thought caused it? I said I couldn't begin to guess why that happened. Tunnel boat design in those days was still more art than science.

[peterse90]

Never did understand why the start/finish had to be mid point on the long straights?

When I raced in the 70's pretty much all our starts were by the clock and personally I much preferred clock starts as IMO it took more skill.
Most start/finish lines were indeed about 1/2 between the corners on an oval course.
On big courses like Valleyfield & Picton there was quite a good run to turn #1...at least that is how it felt in an SE boat of course the S-class & later the MOD U's got to turn #1 much faster.
Pretty much here in Canada by the 80's clock starts were replaced by beach/dock starts and the run to turn #1 was much longer.

[Donzi222]

[FUJIMO]

[Lake X Kid]

...
I also had a guy barrel roll in a turn one complete revolution and kept on going (Capsule boats) He swears it never happened but I watched the whole thing because I was right on his tail and getting ready to pass on the exit pin on the inside lane.

How comfortable would you be racing next to a guy, who barrel rolls but didn't realize he had done it?
I would be a little apprehensive racing side by side with that driver.

It reminds me of the last time, I went deer hunting with my dad, uncle and other guys in their hunting club. A buck and a couple of does run between me and this other dude (around 100 yards from me), and he starts shooting his rifle in my direction at the buck. I never went hunting again, because of trigger-happy dudes.

Boat racing & hunting are apple and oranges comparisons, but they are life lessons.

[GENE LANHAM]

[FUJIMO]

...call me crazy, but i think i recognize that waterway intersection from back in the day......nice 19'/20' donzi hornet pic gene...

[GENE LANHAM]

...call me crazy, but i think i recognize that waterway intersection from back in the day......nice 19'/20' donzi hornet pic gene...

You ain't crazy---the ICW and 188th--

---and you recognize Billy Mc from NE 17th---

[peterse90]

From my 1970 Donzi brochure collection (looks like the same Hornet 19 that Gene posted above);

[peterse90]

Some more 1970 Donzi's (I hope these are OK here in Willabee's HOT SINGLES ?);



IMO the Donzi 21 GT is a perfect example of timeless beauty...and for $12,000 with a 400hp Holman & Moody I think I could even afford one (in today's Canadian $$'s !!!)

[FUJIMO]