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Cool Post Wayne!
I don't believe my Dad was ever too successful in AU... The winner of DOH (DOH!) was Bill Wurster, I drove Unlimited for him in 2004 as the Llumar and I have that D Looper in my basement... I will have to ask Sutter why he ran 2nd in BU. Because I am sure there was a reason and it wasn't his fault! LOL!
J-Dub
Ah, Idylwood!! (see clipping, previous page) A fun, handy (nearby) place to race that we lost as a race site long ago, in fact, only two or three years after that article was written. I was looking at the names, all of which I remember, many belonging to fellows I got to know to one degree or another.
Then I looked at the date of the clipping again, and realized that this was my first boat race!!
An old fellow (like maybe the age I am now?), Pop Tolford, father of racer Hal Tolford, had been in charge of the Seattle Outboard Association's "Novice School" that winter of '64/'65. This consisted of three meetings that featured various people explaining the basics of the sport. There was a pretty good crowd at each; I don't think there were more than half a dozen novices that actually went on to do any racing, but of course most of their dads were there. At the bottom of Wayne's clipping is the name of the "reporter," Bev Downing, mother of Jim and Mike of stock runabout fame, and a regular helper-outer at the races and a very nice lady. One of the few things I recall from the Novice School meetings was when Mike Jones, who had been racing ASH for several years, stood up to say something and prefaced it with, "One of the things you novices can learn from us older guys that have been at this for a while . . ." Mike, then in his mid-twenties I guess, never got any farther because Bill Downing, Bev's husband, began laughing and hooting at Mike for calling himself an "older guy." Mike Jones must be mid-seventies now, and I wonder if he recalls this and if he and Bill ever had a laugh about it.
So, Spring, '65 at Idylwood, and the first event of the day is . . . a Novice Race. Not really a race, because it was a mixture of JU's (no JSH in those days), AU's, ASH's, and my BSH. Half a dozen newbies including me and my neighborhood pal Dave Cordell with his old, heavy Welland ASH (the next year he bought a good Karelsen from Hobart, a prop from Pappa, and gained at least 6mph). Mostly this was intended as a chance for the new guys to run a couple of laps at speed and see what it all looks like from the boat: the clock, the bouys, the other boats, and the flags. Damned good thing, too, because in any group there is likely to be some dumb fool who gets confused. I don't need to tell you who, in this case . . . .
The Novice Race over and confusion dispelled, a few heats run off, then over the P.A., "B Stock Hydro; put 'em in the water!" Oh boy, here it comes! You guys from other places or other times have to understand that Seattle-area boys of that era like me and Cordell had grown up utterly mesmerized by the Unlimiteds, the Gold Cup race, and spent endless hours earnestly discussing the merits of the Slo Mo's, the Thriftway, the Kai, and our local entry, Miss Burien, driven by the Smith family's milkman, Bill Brow. In high school we became aware of outboard racing, of Hal Kelly's Plans, of "Wetbacks" and "Jupiters" and "Foo-Lings", and "Buzzards" and such. Having somehow accumulated the cash with our first decent-paying high school jobs (I was a "baggage-smasher" at the airport) we plunked down the $8 (Wetback) or $12 (Jupiter) for the enormous thrill of getting a brand-new set of boat-plans from the mailbox. With Hal Kelly's bill-of-materials in hand, we each went off to find plywood, spruce or yellow or white cedar (which splits easily, as I learned), Anchorfast nails, Weldwood glue, Flecto Varathane, and Keller hardware (unless we or our dads had managed to find second-hand hardware). All of this was long months before the Novice School, and I later realized it would have been useful to know about lightweight plywoods rather than the lovely but heavy stuff I found at Architectural Woods in Tacoma. Might also have been nice to know how to thin Flecto Varathane (or use something else) so that it would spray properly.
But it all came together anyway, for me, at Idylwood. My Jupiter was (to my eye) absolutely beautiful, the finish flawless, the joinery all perfect, made with love. My dad, thinking to be helpful by putting a very smooth, hard (and presumably fast) finish on the bottom of my boat, laid down a layer of fiberglass on it from stern to bow. It was something he was good at; too bad it took my brand new, already-overweight 9' 10" hydro up to 130 pounds (with hardware), most of it in the nose, LOL. But neither he nor I knew any better (I found out very soon, I'll tell you!!). I had bought a good-running 20H for $300 from BU driver Henry Osterman, a new prop straight from Michigan Wheel (was a steel prop from them $24?). Also a new ($36?) orange GenTex jacket (the last year before they started making them of nylon), and a new, white, open-face Bell helmet procured at some discounted price by Bill Brow, who had somebody on the Miss Burien crew shoot a coat of Day-Glo orange on it (after masking off the novice criss-cross).
"Five-minute gun . . 'BANG'." Set the throttle about halfway, turn your skinny, nineteen-year-old bod entirely around in the 16" cockpit to face the transom, and put your left foot against the gas tank, Set the choke on the Tillotson, put the spray-shield down, and pull the rope out gently to set the rewind pawls; then pull hard and fast.
A wonderful sound! The sound of a converted 20H, the sound I had first heard a year before at a (non-record) race at Yelm on a cold rainy day, the emphatic, open-pipe sound of a real racing engine, the sound that made me want to race outboards, this class of outboards, instead of the 48 Inboards that had previously interested me(Inboards ALL have open pipes).
My boat starts to climb up its bow-wave as I re-orient my self in the cockpit (I never could understand those guys who would reach way back behind them to start the engine while they were facing forward). Release the throttle lock and get the boat on-plane fast, then back off the gas and see where the traffic is and what's what. Here we go, first race, first heat, mouth dry, excited, worried, hoping I can actually do this.
Well, my beautiful boat, built with such love, was the B Stock slug of all time. At that time, at a local short-course race, a quick 57-58mph could win; the best I ever saw with that boat was 53. Not only slow, and with mediocre acceleration, but sponson-heavy, lousy handling, lousy turning. If I had the boat now, I know a bunch of ways I could have fixed its problems, and make it a whole lot better and at least semi-competitive, but at the time I had no clue. In the first heat at Idylwood, I went roaring into the first turn, about 9th place (we always had full 12-boat heats in those years), hooked on a roller, and was thrown out of the cockpit. I found myself ignominiously hanging on to the wheel with one hand with my feet in the cockpit and my butt sitting on the deck as the boat coasted to a stop while I tried to drag myself back in. In the second turn of the second heat I was thrown entirely out of the boat. An exciting first race for a soft, pink newbie, but not auspicious. The rest of that season was spent learning how little you can see mid-pack in the first turn, and spending each heat trying to finish no worse than 10th. I wonder why it now seems like it was so much fun!!
Thank you for the clipping, Wayne.
Smitty, of all the literature "short stories" I read in college, none compare to this! You have a gift for writing! I could actually imagine it as if I were in that race... Thanks for sharing!!
I agree champ. Smitty and I have been corresponding for awhile regarding some of the great Region 10 and 11 and 12 racers that he grew up with. We both know many of them, and have had e mail talks about them. I have known from the very beginning when Smitty first started to post things before we got acquainted that he had a gift. I was just surprised that the column from Propeller turned out to be about the beginning of his racing career and sparked his ability to finally come forward.
Smitty has written an excellent piece on his boat racing start. To me it sounds like the beginning of many kids starting at the golden age of boat racing. My brother Mark and myself built a boat after watching Ron Musson run underneath a bridge spanning a river and the roostertail wet the cables holding up the suspension bridge. Smitty's excellent narrative took me back to those days.
I went through the few Propellers I have from the 1960,s and 1970 and found these clippings.
First two are from May 1969. They posted backwards. I'll do another page to try not to get these all out of order.
Wasting time and I think I found a picture of these pipes. Ron Hill 1966. Google: Boat Racing Facts "Photos" A runabout looper. The thread is Nov 28,2004 in Outboard History forum.
I know a lot of these guys from my racing days, and a few others I have gotten to know a little through BRF.
This one is from September 1969.
Got to leave now. Finish up later.
A real ALKY RACER--
Look at the results of COH in the post above. The winner was Hans Moen.
We were at the nationals in Dupue and pitted near Hans. I saw him roll his boat into the water as it was his heat up next. The only other person near him was a lady,his wife I guess. I figured he could use some help so I went and offered a hand. He said no we're alright,she can hold the boat. I was surprised so I backed off a ways and turned around and watched. The cannon fired she was just steadying the boat,no lifting,Hans wrapped the rope,gave it a pull and off he went. And I thought I was a Racer. I need 2 lifters and a starting stand to do the same thing! MY HERO,HANS!
Bruce
Hans was a great member to Seattle Outboard Association for many years. As a young racer (And before!) I always admired him. He had a small engine repair shop that was also a Mercury dealer in the small Eastern Washington town of Bridgeport. Bridgeport is about 20 minutes past the edge of nowhere... We raced there on the Columbia River for several years through the 70's and early 80's, this was also my first ever J Hydro race in 1982.
Hans celebrated his 100th Birthday about a year ago!
J-Dub
Our Pipes Were ALL ALUMINUM
Originally Posted by rumleyfips
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