I was 10 or 11 at the Hennesey Race in Indy and hit up dad for two quarters. One of them hit for a .60 G & M Models flat bottom mono (Misty?). It was a very quick build and was running in a few weeks with HP.61, side port, nonmuffled, mounted on an angle so most of the exhaust could maybe get out of the hull. When this boat was first set in the lake it arced left and we couldn't keep it from crashing in that block wall just pass the dock at the old "Just Add Water" pond. Some of you "Longtime Boaters" might rember that most unique race site. Later, Gary taught us to just slam it down in the water to get it on plane.
Sidebar: That race was cool! On Saturday there was a pontoon boat that would go out by the shore from the northwest side of the pond and travel counter clockwise following near the shore to the southeast corner and turn around to go back. This was all going on while the race was being ran. It was simulating ocean waves to get that realistic offshore racing feel. It was later decided to stop that practice, but the reason had noting to do with safety!
My next was a Ed Hughey round nose with a Veco .19 followed with I think a Daniels OPS.60 deep v.
Then came the riggers in the early mid 70's. Wing Dings 20, 40, 60 and twin 60 with twin shafts at the 75 Nats. I still have Dad's first place trophy for timed oval with his twin.
My next raffle winner was Detroit built .40 Crapshooter with the hardwood sponson booms powered first with OS.40s then later powered by K&B 6.5 & 7.5. Get this, I wanted to mount the water pick up and turn fin just like my 20 Hughey roundnose. I thought I knew my stuff. Boy that boat could get up in the air! DAD FIXED THAT PROBLEM QUICK.
Late 70's to mid 80's all Marty Davis Crapshooters, I had the black & dayglo pink. None of those other guys were man enough to take the pink, so they left it for the kid. See Andy & John it is a curse they put on me way back. I have to tell the rest of this story. At the 2001 Nats in Sarasota, Either Andy or John Brown sent his son over to inform me that my pink boat was a girls boat. I was busting a gut inside, but I could not let it show. I explained to him the only thing worse than owning a pink boat was getting beat by one.
Back on topic...Early 90's a Mr. Pinkert .60 Coyote made the fleet. Good runner. I narrowed up the center section.
93 to late 90's scratch built carbon fiber Raptors and Miss US1/8th scale. Still have some bare Raptor tubs laying around.
Late 90's to present Ralph Almirola buit Roadrunners.
Thanks for starting this topic, for I enjoyed reading and sharing on this one. My wife kept asking me why I was laughing while I was typing. I'm sorry for wandering and being so long.
MG
BOY AN COULD THIS KID COULD DRIVE !! He was the first competitor to beat Mike Meelbusch head to head that I ever saw.. Mike was Octura's Factory Driver and Mark put it on him at about age 12-13.
Mark is Still one of the best drivers in the Country.... I love to have a chance to race Mark and now his Kid Chad(who is about as good as Dad). I'm Getting a little old to be able to compete with these guys. You have to have some luck and a great running boat to beat either one of them.
The Day Glow Boats were a thing that I came up with to let people know that they were racing against a factory Crapshooter Driver in those days. Eash one of us had a different Day Glow Colored Cowling on an All Black Boat. Mark was just the last one to get a choice of colors since he was the "Pup". I can remember each color and who owned it, except one: Howie Whitaker = Yellow, Tom Grannis = Orange, Marty Davis = Green, Greg Huey = Red, ???= Blue. In the late 70's and early 80's Crapshooters were the boat to beat. I almost forgot, the only other Factory Driver during that time was Ed Lackey. He helped me with development almost as much as anyone and was one of the 5 best drivers that I EVER saw race. I miss racing with him a lot. Doc Turner can tell you just how good he was.....
Wow this is fun thining about the "old days".
One of the coolest things was the Indy Unlimited. We allowed 120 boats entered. There was ONLY 1 class. Everyone raced against each other in a "run what you brung". The prize table was over 5,000-$8,000 and the winner got either a lathe or a mill and even down to last place got a nice prize. Took about as long as Atlanta to fill up. Some of the most competitive racing EVER. Maybe some day, we will get someone to host an unlimited race. Bet it would be as big a hit as back then.
Marty Davis
