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Grand Rapids
Was the first "far" race we started going to in the early 80's, out of the region even! I think the speed limit was 55 back then so it took a solid 4 hours to get there from my parents. That was a haul
in those days. Unfortunately we were'nt smart enough to go Friday night and camp. We would leave very early Sat am. With loosing an hour going east we would always worry that we would be late for registration. We were one year when I traveled up with Tom Newberry. We blew a tire on his trailer and the bolt pattern on his spare was wrong. it was early am Sat when it happened so of course the tire shops were'nt open.
Got my first top three ever there one year due to gun jumpers. That was when the course was at the north end of the park. There was less room there vs the southern end of the park where the race was run in the late 80's with the Merc Challenge. There was also a culvert that dumped water into the river right before the start line, kinda made for some interesting handling on that part of the river.
One year we along with Mike Crawford made the mistake of pitting next to the concession stand. It rained non stop all weekend so we stayed huddled under the tarps by our trailers. Unfortunately we were right next to the generator for the concession stand, about drove us nuts listening to that thing!
Might have been the same year that we ran out of gas leaving the pits on Saturday evening. It was raining and Mike and I pushed the car down the street to the gas station while dad steered. All of our racing gas was mixed with oil and at that time we really did'nt know anybody......
Pic of me in 125V must have been '88 or '89. 26V is Jim Sobol in ASH. 24W was Brad Schaub, 191W Garrett Armstrong. Check out those conventional hydros!
One of our worst weekends of racing was there in '84. The race was in June. Both Mike and I were running ASH and my dad 15SSH. I broke the crank on my Mark 15. Mike was borrowing a KG4 from Jake Schallcross in order to race as at that time it was VERY difficult finding "A" engines and he threw a rod. Holes everywhere in the case including the carb. My dad flipped and when he was towed in upside down the power head was dragged across a sandbar or something and messed it up. Needless to say with no engines our trip to Wakefiled was cancelled. I think that weekend is the reason why Mike is such a firm believer in having back up engines
Thanks Tom for posting the pic's. Lots of good memories.
Bill
PS almost forgot. Green flag for 15SSH is thrown and here is Tom Moulder sitting on a large rock on the bank very casually putting on his knee pads while carrying on a conversation with someone. We get my dad going and just stare as Tom keeps talking while getting into his boat. Engine starts on first pull and off he goes. At that time being relatively new to racing and not having the best equipment, we would always be sitting nervously in the boat a heat before ours double checking everything. We could not believe someone would take a "risk" like that.
PSS for back in the day they sure had a good tee shirt. Had 3 25SSH's on it along with "Doc Adams Memorial Regatta" and some sponsor logos. I wore that shirt proudly to school, still have it.
who was Doc Adams by the way?
Was the first "far" race we started going to in the early 80's, out of the region even! I think the speed limit was 55 back then so it took a solid 4 hours to get there from my parents. That was a haul
in those days. Unfortunately we were'nt smart enough to go Friday night and camp. We would leave very early Sat am. With loosing an hour going east we would always worry that we would be late for registration. We were one year when I traveled up with Tom Newberry. We blew a tire on his trailer and the bolt pattern on his spare was wrong. it was early am Sat when it happened so of course the tire shops were'nt open.Got my first top three ever there one year due to gun jumpers. That was when the course was at the north end of the park. There was less room there vs the southern end of the park where the race was run in the late 80's with the Merc Challenge. There was also a culvert that dumped water into the river right before the start line, kinda made for some interesting handling on that part of the river.
One year we along with Mike Crawford made the mistake of pitting next to the concession stand. It rained non stop all weekend so we stayed huddled under the tarps by our trailers. Unfortunately we were right next to the generator for the concession stand, about drove us nuts listening to that thing!
Might have been the same year that we ran out of gas leaving the pits on Saturday evening. It was raining and Mike and I pushed the car down the street to the gas station while dad steered. All of our racing gas was mixed with oil and at that time we really did'nt know anybody......
Pic of me in 125V must have been '88 or '89. 26V is Jim Sobol in ASH. 24W was Brad Schaub, 191W Garrett Armstrong. Check out those conventional hydros!
One of our worst weekends of racing was there in '84. The race was in June. Both Mike and I were running ASH and my dad 15SSH. I broke the crank on my Mark 15. Mike was borrowing a KG4 from Jake Schallcross in order to race as at that time it was VERY difficult finding "A" engines and he threw a rod. Holes everywhere in the case including the carb. My dad flipped and when he was towed in upside down the power head was dragged across a sandbar or something and messed it up. Needless to say with no engines our trip to Wakefiled was cancelled. I think that weekend is the reason why Mike is such a firm believer in having back up engines
Thanks Tom for posting the pic's. Lots of good memories.
Bill
PS almost forgot. Green flag for 15SSH is thrown and here is Tom Moulder sitting on a large rock on the bank very casually putting on his knee pads while carrying on a conversation with someone. We get my dad going and just stare as Tom keeps talking while getting into his boat. Engine starts on first pull and off he goes. At that time being relatively new to racing and not having the best equipment, we would always be sitting nervously in the boat a heat before ours double checking everything. We could not believe someone would take a "risk" like that.
PSS for back in the day they sure had a good tee shirt. Had 3 25SSH's on it along with "Doc Adams Memorial Regatta" and some sponsor logos. I wore that shirt proudly to school, still have it.
who was Doc Adams by the way?
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