Facts about Evinrude/Johnson racing outboards made my OMC

[lars strom]

Nora, Sweden 1976.
UIM SE class #1 Clerici/Evinrude FT-19s.

[lars strom]

Evinrude V-6 225HP

[lars strom]

Paris, 1974
UIM OE class #48 Clerici/Evinrude

[lars strom]

[lars strom]

Evinrude V-6 225HP

[2us70]

By American standards of the day that looks like a pretty big boat for E class. How long and how much did it weigh? All but one of the SE boats I ever ran were 13' to 13'6" and under 200#.

Paris, 1974
UIM OE class #48 Clerici/Evinrude

[peterse90]

By American standards of the day that looks like a pretty big boat for E class. How long and how much did it weigh? All but one of the SE boats I ever ran were 13' to 13'6" and under 200#.

Paris 6 Hour was a marathon. An SE boat with adequate length (14 or 14+ feet) and tunnel depth would be the minimum needed...a sprint boat just would not last plus the driver needs a little comfort if they are going to last 6 hours.

[2us70]

In 1969 I built myself a SE marathon boat. It wasn't very pretty but it was brutally effective. 15'6" long 4' beam steep deadrise with 4 small strakes per side. I could carry a 3 hour fuel load and run it through the roughest water. I won a race with it once because my main competitor literally broke his boat in half in rough water off the Florida Keys.

[lars strom]

Paris 6 Hour was a marathon. An SE boat with adequate length (14 or 14+ feet) and tunnel depth would be the minimum needed...a sprint boat just would not last plus the driver needs a little comfort if they are going to last 6 hours.

My #48 Clerici/Evinrude above was a sprint SE boat I raced in Paris 6 Hours. 1974 there was no SE class in Paris and I finnish third in the OE class that year.
I won the European SE class Sprint Championship a few weeks before Paris with the yellow Clerici #99.

[2us70]

How fast were you guys running in SE over there? The boat I ran at the 73 Nationals ran about 71mph.

[peterse90]

My #48 Clerici/Evinrude above was a sprint SE boat I raced in Paris 6 Hours. 1974 there was no SE class in Paris and I finnish third in the OE class that year.
I won the European SE class Sprint Championship a few weeks before Paris with the yellow Clerici #99.

Lars, IMO I think what would be considered a sprint tunnel in Europe VS. the US would be somewhat different in the early-mid 70's. Some of the US sprint boats I think were kneel-down and had very shallow tunnels. Your Clerici above looks averaged sized in terms of tunnel depth and how much boat is around you in your sitting position. I would guess a 'marathon' Clerici would not necessarily be longer but maybe a little deeper and maybe a little wider.

2us70, I think my Seebold/Merc 650XS that I raced here in Canada in 1978 & 1979 on a good day would maybe go 75 mph. The Canadian kilo record for SE was set in 1977 at just over 77 mph by John Sherlock with a 650XS.

[2us70]

These two pictures are of the boat I ran at Nationals in 1973. The first one is with a 650. The second one was taken the following year at Miami with a 500 on it in SD. In this one you can see some of extension work on the bow as well as the basic tunnel and sponson design. I only recently got this picture from this site. The driver in this case was the customer that Action sold the boat to after we quit running it in SE. The motor seen at the bottom right of the picture is yours truly, so I was unaware of the chaos behind me until recently.

[Greg G]

That must have been very cool for you to see the photo decades later.

[lars strom]

How fast were you guys running in SE over there? The boat I ran at the 73 Nationals ran about 71mph.

Well..the Clerici sprint SE boats was very light and fast. Only around 200 pound empty without power and hardware.



My 1973 #99 SE Clerici/Evinrude 65 SS was between 75-80 MPH a good day



My 1974 SE class Clerici/Evinrude with the new nitro gearcase was 85+ MPH



My 1975 #1 Clerici/Evinrude Hustler was 85-90 MPH



My 1976 Clerici purpose built for the new Evinrude FT-19s was extremely fast 95+ MPH

[lars strom]

The 1975 SE class memories..


European Champion for the third consecutive year 1975



After the Race in Forsaa, Finland and my enormous success in the SE class the
past 3 years winning over 50 races rumors was circulating that I had a special engine from OMC.
Well, I DID NOT and the engine I used on my own Clerici SE boat 1975 was a stock short leg 75 Hp Evinrude from my inventory at my dealership.
A legal higher compression cylinder head was the only change, and the race power trim and stiff rubber mount.
I can tell the truth now, and the speed advantage was from the boat and the set up and my driving style.
One way to get the much higher top speed was to raise the engine up much higher than normal race set up.
The stock gear case was like a brake, and I was 2-3″ above everybody else, BUT that made it very difficult to drive/handle the boat.
The prop lost the grip, and the engine lost the cooling water but the trick was to just before the prop lost the grip to use power trim and throttle/steering to avoid that to happen.
I tested for many days and weeks how far you could drive before the engine started to
overheat and that was around 900 meters.
I lost many powerheads before I found out a way to back of just a little to pick up enough water to cool the engine on the straight a way before the turn.
On top of that you have to use the power trim in and out in a special way to make the “air bag” under the tunnel to lift the boat and I have to say that was my best
advantage.
The Big race this year was Sabaudia Italy, and I called friends in Italy to find out about this new place for the race and was told that it is in a Lagoon, shallow water and flat water.
That was for me great news, and I worked on raising the engine even higher on the transom and picked up a few more MPH.
There was a local race in Stockholm before the Big one, and I used that race as a test. Bad news..hooked and rolled.
Damage the boat, a few days after I told Paul Kalb that I preferred
to race my own boat instead of the factory SE boat.
I got help to repair my boat just in time to make it to Italy.
Normally I was hiding everything I was doing, (learned from Molinari) but for this Big race I changed that.
Parked the boat in the pit so everybody could see my set up and prop.
I told the Race officials that I want my engine inspected before the
race to put an end to “the special engine”rumor.
They said No, but told me that my engine is going to be inspected very seriously after the race if I was the winner.
I have never felt so ready to win a race and now all the good things started to happen.
Around 35 boats was at the race, and most drivers looked at my race set up and started to raise up there engines higher. That was my plan…
Mercury had maybe 10 drivers using the 650 XS.
4 heat, 3 counts and clock start and I was pretty good at them and took the start and turned first.
Then just pulled away on the long two turn race course.
Many drivers was hooking left and right, because they could not
drive with the engine that high.
This race was for me a perfect one. I won 3 heat in a row and did not race the last one.
I asked the officials to start taking my engine apart and they did.
The power head, mid section even the gear case to check gears and impeller and everybody could now see it was a stock 75 hp Evinrude.
Never worked on the ports or pistons.
Just standard.
Lots of disappointed people when my engine was cleared, but
Lars was happy and the European Champion for the third consecutive year.

http://svera.se/blogg/racing-histori...secutive-year/