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Thread: An Amazing Story: Part 2

  1. #551
    Team Member Master Oil Racing Team's Avatar
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    Probably. I remembered him from DeLake in 1979 and at Yelm, but I had forgotten what he looked like.



  2. #552
    J-Dub J-Dub's Avatar
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    Ralph was a deck rider with Howard Anderson who he also worked for when he was younger and then he later worked at The Prop Shop with Ron Anderson.
    He also made quite a few pipes for some guys out here being he is a very talented welder.

    J-Dub

  3. #553
    Team Member Master Oil Racing Team's Avatar
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    Thanks for the info J Dub. I was wondering if you ever heard of "Fireball" DeSouza. He is in the next part of the story. I never got a roster of drivers from Yelm and my notes only mention a "Fireball" DeSouza. That's all I heard him called. Might that be Steve DeSouza?



  4. #554
    J-Dub J-Dub's Avatar
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    "Fireball" is a one of the exutives of Joe Gibbs Racing. As I understand he runs the Nationwide Series team of JGR. His brother-in-law Drew Thompson races CSR out here and gives a report now and then on 'Ol "Fireball." He IS a member on this site too.

    J-Dub

  5. #555
    Team Member Master Oil Racing Team's Avatar
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    That's interesting. Well "Fireball" DeSouza plays a part in this next story. It was the last time I wrote any extensive notes on a race. I was so pumped, I wrote it down on my flight home.

    Since we got our new laydown Butts Aerowing, I had not spent much time in it. We were blown out at the first race in Laredo, all the motors were down in power in Acapulco and I backed off just to help make a show with the other boats, we had a good couple of heats at Dayton, and LaCrosse was cancelled. So here was a good time to see what it would do on fast water with a surveyed course. I was disappointed the water was too low for the 1 2/3rds mile course. I would have liked once more to try to break 100. Anyway, we would get a chance to put it through its paces.

    It was the first heat of the 1100 hydro Nationals held on Saturday September 13, having been awarded to Yelm after the cancellation of La Crosse. It was a cold and rainy day, with the temperature around 55 degrees F. I don't know why, but I was wearing dark glasses under my yellow tinted goggles. We generally wait until 3 minutes on the clock and in this particular heat, we waited almost too long. While our motors generally start right off, especially with my Dad snapping the rope, our motor didn't want to start on this cold, damp day. Part of the reason was due to this particular motor. It was the 4 carb, dual rotary valve motor we bought from Marshall Grant. You could squirt gas all the way through the motor and out the other side if you didn't hit the crank. In my book I wrote "The motor did not want to start & on the 15th or so pull it grudginly began to rev." I pulled out of the pits and ran down the back straight which was straight out of the pits.

    I looked back at the clock and didn't see any lights. I never heard the gun go off or saw any smoke. It must have gone off right after I pulled out of the pits and while I was looking back to check the tattletale for water. This was my first time on this course since 1977 and had forgotten about the clock. It had a black background and I thought it was one of those "pie clocks" which rotates white, becoming a fully white circle at the last second. All the other boats were grouping down at the bottom of the course and I kept looking for the white disc. I slowed down and started to come around for another pass. The main problem I had with the laydown Butts was milling before a start. I couldn't see around as well so I stayed clear of other boats, and I made terrible starts. Then I happened to see that they were lining up for a start. I turned back and stared very hard at the clock and then I noticed a red hand with only about 5 seconds left on the clock.

    I had already committed to the infield and so was required by local rules to go around the third turn bouy to make a legal start. When I came out of turn 4 and began to accelerate the lead boats were already going into turn 1. I was half the race course behind. Ron Anderson put the stop watch on me and said that I started 35 seconds late, but was only 4 seconds behind the winner "Fireball" DeSouza at the finish with a second place. He said one more lap and I would have won.

    A couple of things are indelibly etched in my mind about that heat. The first was the incredible speeds with which that laydown Butts could corner. I can still remember how the outside sponson would pound the water. The boat felt as if it never set. It felt as if the inside sponson was flying and the boat pivoting on the turn fin and the outside sponson would slap the water and come back up. When it hit, my helmet would compress down and for a fraction of a second, block my vision. I don't know exactly how that happed because I always wore a snug helmet. And I don't know why it didn't dislodge my goggles. But it was bump, bump, bump all the way through the middle part of the turn. I let my body just drift to the right side of the cockpit. There was no way I could have ever stayed in Shadowfax in a turn that hard. Tim had also built a 7 inch tower housing so our center of gravity was very low.

    The second thing was the fish. I don't know what kind it was, but it was about two or three pounds. It jumped out of the water in front of me....just one of those typical jumps arching over and ploppiing back into the water. But from my vantage point, however, it looked as if it were a missle launched from a sub. When I first saw if leap out of the water it was a little speck of a fish. When it flashed past me on my left, it was considerably larger. The whole thing took only about a second....not more than two. It passed between the left picklefork and the cockpit and just about the top of the plexiglass windshield. At the time I was just amazed at what appeared to be a fish that was shot at me and was about the weirdest thing I ever saw during a race. I never slowed down or even thought about what might have happened if it would have been a couple of feet more to my right.

    That was one race I'll never forget. Rusty Rae caught some photos of the race and sent me this pic.
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    Last edited by Master Oil Racing Team; 10-13-2008 at 12:59 PM. Reason: clarification



  6. #556
    Sam Cullis Mark75H's Avatar
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    Since 1925, about 150 different racing outboards have been made.


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