Gold Coast Marathon

[2us70]

So many familiar names on that list.

[Tx Guy]

Thanks for posting!

[Lake X Kid]

Typical with something the Gubment does, they got the year wrong. This is the 1962 Gold Coast Marathon. Dave ran the Vee Wing in 63, and I ran Treasures boat. Still a pretty good video..

[Lake X Kid]

From 1949 until sometime in the early 1970s, speed boat enthusiasts raced in the Gold Coast Marathon, an unlimited race with as many as 13 classes from the Pelican Harbor Yacht Club at the 79th Street Causeway to West Palm Beach and back the following day. The brainchild of Sam Griffiths, founder of the Pelican Harbor Yacht Club, Griffiths himself was a powerboat racer who won the first Marathon and two others.

Top finishers completed the first 67-mile leg in one hour. The very best drivers in hydroplanes topped 100 miles per hour in the fastest stretches of the race course. In later years, the Marathon moved to the new Miami Marine Stadium amidst safety concerns when scores of small boats entered the race. Toward the end, the Marathon garnered the sanctioning of the prestigious American Power Boating Association.

The long-abandoned Stadium is now in the hands of preservationists who hope to restore the Stadium to its former beauty and style along with educational programming.
per author Bill Crawford - Florida's Big Dig.

1959 Gold Coast Marathon race start.

[Lake X Kid]

1964 GCM.
Charlie Wolff in George Griley's "Bubblecat".
I borrowed the engines from Phil Young.
They were Merc 700's and were completely frozen just a couple of days before the race.
I got one to turn by pouring oil into it. The other was so frozen I pulled it apart and rebuilt it.
I was working part time for Dade Marine and they had a crankshaft.
I worked all night rebuilding the engine with what ever parts I could dig up.
Without any testing I ran the race and the engines never even coughed!
The boat could only go about 70 MPH at the most. Ran wide open the complete race
and averaged almost the same as the top speed.
Came in about 6th or 7th overall out of around 200 boats.
Not bad for a 22 year old college kid with absolutely no money and a borrowed boat and engines!

[2us70]

!964 was my first Gold Coast. In those days everyone wanted to be in that race. I and many of my friends at the time worked furiously to put something together for this race. I was fortunate to run it to West Palm twice. Still some of the most memorable experiences of my life. It was never the same when they changed the format.

[GENE LANHAM]

!964 was my first Gold Coast. In those days everyone wanted to be in that race. I and many of my friends at the time worked furiously to put something together for this race. I was fortunate to run it to West Palm twice. Still some of the most memorable experiences of my life. It was never the same when they changed the format.

[Bob V]

[GENE LANHAM]

I think what is being failed to be mentioned here..... is the fact that this race was run on the inside of the Intercoastal.

Imagine from Miami to Palm Beach with the wildest and fastest boats of the day long before there were any kind of good navigation or channel marks ..... you get the picture.

Sam Griffith started it and once drove a 3 point hydro in the race.....but as already mentioned before....... the Switzer wings were the class of the event and stand out in everyones memory.

Many drivers who were new to the area, would find themsleves turning into dead end canals at speed and then trying to return safely to the main intercoastal..... while others were going by at full speed.

Many boats sank due to hitting floating coconuts.

WOW!!!

CHARLIE wrote this 12 years ago!!!!

[Tx Guy]

I'm somewhere in this mess in my Sidcraft BU.

[2us70]

And "it seemed perfectly reasonable at the time".

[Lake X Kid]

[FUJIMO]

...the gold rush... https://youtu.be/MMB0dtuoVOA

[Instigator]

Ive seen that great video before.

Thx for posting it.

As a 61 yr old, life long power boat racing fan, I still can’t wrap my head around this race.

These days everyone would be required to have capsules, helicopter manatee patrols and a 45 mph speed limit.
And there’d still be protesters!

I would have raced anything I had just to be a part of that history.

On a much smaller scale, the oval course outlaw races behind the Caribbean Club in Key Largo are also way up on my list.
A 17’ Whaler against a 17’ race tunnel!

...the gold rush... https://youtu.be/MMB0dtuoVOA

[2us70]

I still see Richard Bennett every once in a while. My wife's cousin Hugh Spencer (several time SD champ and record holder) is his brother in-law. I knew the Bennetts very well back in those days.