An Amazing Story: Part 2

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I brought that new 48 mm carb D Konig back from Berlin and we rigged it up on Shadowfax to take to the Pro Nationals at Alex. They were held on September 26-30, 1979. I never made any test sheets, and I don't have any record on that motor including the serial number.

I didn't have to qualify since I was the defending champ, but sometimes I'm not sure that is a big help. You don't have a feel for what the competition has got by watching from the bank. I was back in the old comfortable cockpit of "Shadowfax" and the motor felt good, but it did not have enough top end.

I made a good start in the first heat, but got outrun to the turn. I was second down the backstraight, but I hit a course marker and knocked the turn fin up. I have no clue why I got so close, but my notes just say I couldn't turn good after that. I remember going down the front straight and trying to push it down, but I couldn't. Then for some reason I didn't write down, we were black flagged.

On the restart it appeared from where I was, and on the bank that 6 or 7 boats jumped the gun. I thought I was the first legal boat, so I didn't try to take the lead and maybe have something screwy happened. I just cruised along and passed a couple and as long as no one passed me I figured I was in good shape. As it turned out only two were disqualified so I finished 3rd overall.

I got another good start in the final heat and beat all of them to the turn, but Jim Stone and several others were faster. I finished 4th and it was good for third overall.

These pics were all taken by Debbie except the last one.

[wboxell]

wayne, who's that beside ya in the fourth pic? aerowing?

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Bill, that's our good friend Tim Butts in his brand new lay down Aerowing.

[carl sladek]

hey master oil,
how did you make that clear cow?
how much speed did it add?

and are konigs hard to work on?

"oh ya, well you can't even name an english tennis ball!", him
"Slazennger", me
"well dunlop is another", him
"Oh ya, you think you are so smart, you can't name the german outboard racing engine that runs on methanol", me
"porsche" him (careful to pronounce it as poor-sha')
"that's wrong , it's konig, see there, you are stupid, you don't know anything", me

I guess you had to be there

[F-12]

Huh? I guess you really did have to be there...................

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Can't sez I remember being there either.

The Konigs are easy to take apart and put back together if that's what you mean Carl. If you mean diagnosing and correcting problems, I don't know that they are any harder or simpler than other motors.

If you mean clear cowl on the other question....the Aerowing doesn't have one in this pic, and I don't know where Tim got the ones he later had made and installed. Speedwise...couldn't say. But it did lessen distractions from driving through water (uh...roostertails.)

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I forgot to post the qualifying and finals heat rosters.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

This is the story I did for Powerboat. I didn't write about anyone other than those who won because Powerboat was changing around the racing coverage. Mark Spencer said they were cutting back the number of photos and basically wanted the story to revolve around a few key races, and go with the color of the story. No recap of the actions of the heats and the top three or five unless there were only two or three classes competing. And I don't have final results in my file folder. I'll go check the propeller and newspaper clippings in my scrapbook to see what the results were.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Okay...here are the individual results.

Heat one
1 Jim Stone
2 John Yale
3 Wayne Baldwin
4 Bob McGinty

Heat two
1 Jim Stone
2 Jerry Kirts
3 Tim Butts
4 Wayne Baldwin
5 John Yale

Overall: Stone, Yale, Baldwin

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I don't remember exactly when Tim Butts set up shop in Texas, but it was by this point in time. Joe would know because Tim's shop was in a little warehouse strip across the RR tracks from Joe's shop. It was just a few minutes trip if the traffic wasn't stacked up.

Tim and Ruth had been spending the time around Christmas and New Years with us for several years and the testing time was invaluable. If the weather was bad, it was either a drizzly, cold and miserable, which meant a good time in the comfort of my Dad's house, or it was blowing a gale. It didn't matter if the blow was from the North or South. The direction only meant excellent weather by the next day or the following one.

So a few days after the Nationals Tim came down. I don't have in my journal what we were testing. It could have been a boat design or possibly the ZAK crossover manifold, or both. I have an entry from a couple of weeks later regarding the manifold and Elmer Grade. Tim says that Elmer suggests removing the tabs for a short course. He did a dyno test and the velocities increased tremendously. It improved the bottom end and midrange. The top end was bad. With a 350 Yamato he was straining to get 70hp and standard was 65. In this test, it got over 80. I don't remember any of this. I am only writing from my notes. One thing I do know is that we didn't race with the manifold because it was not as good around the course as a motor without it. I am guessing that above a certain RPM, bottom end positive effects ended and the top end was seriously affected.

Tim was back the following week for more testing. He had a series of tests to conduct and we scheduled a meeting of Hydroplanes International for the upcoming UIM OD World Championships. Steve Jones had received a firm bid of $5,000 from the city of Laredo. He was going to call Gatorade the middle of the next week to find out their status and Laredo was helping us to secure the Budweiser boat and sound system.

On October 22 Tim tested some motor modifications. It may have been stuff other than the crossover manifold. I don't have any test sheets. I do know that somewhere around this time Tim sent his new D Konig to Ron Anderson for port work and other improvements.

At our meeting we laid the groundwork for the 700cc Pro Nationals, the UIM OD World Championships and the beginnings of a circuit with only one class. This was not the ultimate goal...only the beginning of what my Dad, myself, Joe Rome, Steve Jones, Tim Butts, Marshall Grant and Jerry Waldman had envisioned going back to late '71 early '72.

Elmer Grade was 100 percent behind our efforts. Elmer sent a brief letter regarding UIM plans and some photos. Later at the end of October I have a note that Tim called and let us know that Steve Jones gave him info from Gatorade regarding Laredo. At this time, we had definitely committed to Laredo rather than St. Louis. We were all down here close. Laredo was fired up, and St Louis could fit in at some point in our plans with the circuit.

On November 1st I called Bob Ottum with Sports Illustrated to tell him about our event. We had a date...May 3rd and 4th for the 1980 UIM OD World Championships. I gave him a list of the expected participants at that time. 3 Germans, 3 Austrians, 2 South Africans, 2 Japanese, 4 Canadians, and 1 Englishman, as well as the U.S. entries. A few weeks earlier I had written Fidel Guzman from Federacion de Motonautique for interest from Mexico. So things were progressing nicely toward a professional international type class of outboards OF and smaller.