Top O' Helmet cam by Pete Schwab

[Jeff Akers]

Yer not gettin ME to wear any helmet cam!
I have a phobia of those things. I always worry about going to use the can and forget that I have the thing on!
To make it worse... I've heard that Michigan lake water is COLD!

Ok, enough small talk Jeff LOL!

Do you know anyone with a Helicopter ? Now that would be cool !

[CSR4C]

The water is not cold

In August the water is not cold. We usually go swimming.
The year they ran the race in June, that was a different story.

Darrell

[modhydro]

Top O' First Timer

Darrell,

I'll be there with a 25 as well. I am getting the engine this thursday from a friend to get it rigged up.

I can't wait. Unfortunately, my son has his first day of junior high and I figure he shouldn't miss that, even for this race. Next year he will be with me though.

Thanks again for the tips.

Steve Roskowski

[jeff55v]

I'll be there with a 25 as well. Steve Roskowski

It'll be great to finally meet you Steve.

Hey Jeff A. : I thought someone else would jump in with an answer to your question. Anyway, I remember this post from March '07:

We just want to let all the racers know that we will be filming the Top O' Michigan Marathon again this year. We will be looking for some good interviews with drivers in the pits - so don't be shy when you see the cameras this year. Jane and Pat McGinnis - McGinnis Video Productions.

[Jeff Akers]

Awesome Jeff, thats great news, thanks for reposting it

I did get a PM on the question I asked.......Thank you !

[Arcticracer]

Come to Alaska!

Here's an idea, get some stock outboard racers to travel to Fairbanks to play in the Yukon 800. We could set up refueling checkpoints along the course, and/or shorten the course for them. Back in the day Alaska was a part of region 10, but stock racing (or any racing other than the Fairbanks Club) ceased many years ago. At one time there were some of the jet guys from Western Canada interested in coming but that never did happen.

Yes it is a long ways, yes you would have fun, yes it would be brutal in a boat that is not purpose built for the race, give it some thought! The race is on summer solstice wekend around June 21st. Around 2000 miles from Seattle.

Darrell I know you wanna do it....... Bring Ric.

PS: Can't come to Nationals, just quit my job of 27 years and started a new one, so my vacation time has been, well, changed.

[jeff55v]

I sent out a lot of copies of Pete's video, just wondering how much beer there will be for me? There were 6 Ds, 3 Cs, 1 A & 3 Js indicating they were doing their best to make the race this year. (Js soft drinks only please).

Let's hear from you,

Darrell
C-4-C

Darrell, I just wanted to thank you once more for helping turn me on to this race. Without a doubt, this was the most exciting race I've ever been to. I'm hooked. Can't wait to do it again.
I bet that beer I bought you went down well. Ain't no beer like free beer, eh?
I wish I could've hung out with ya a little more at the awards banquet. I kinda had my hands full with my Wife and pit crew. (kids)
See ya next year!

[wildstormfilms]

The video is poorly edited and of poor quality since it uses third or fourth generation video from one of our DVDs.

There seems to be people that like the trailer. How is it poorly edited? Whats wrong with the graphics? Plus you really can't upload ultra high quality video on youtube anyways.

[janemcvideo]

Marathon Trailer

Lee, my comments on the Marathon Trailer were posted prior to your email that you would remove the video from uTube. Our primary objection was the fact that you "illegally" used a copyrighted music track from another source - you used our footage without permission and by adding the music track you are by implication implying that our video used this unauthorized music. Why should we be grateful that you have associated our video with illegally used music? We obviously don't think our footage is bad, and neither do most of the racers who have seen it. What is bad is taking video that is several generations from the original and expecting it to look as good as the original. As I mentioned in my email to you, we understand your enthusiasm in wanting to promote this race. Prior to last year, except for a few home movies, no one has ever filmed the Top O' Michigan Marathon and made it available to the racers. We have invested considerable time and resources into providing this service, we have made copies of the DVD available to the Top O' Michigan Club, offered to do a promo video for them at no cost, provided hundreds of free digital photos of the event, and this year we even sponsored one of the racers. There is no way we even come close to breaking even on this project so to say we are only motivated by money is ridiculous. We have been in this business for over thirty years and we are proud of the reputation we have earned for our quality products and services. Over the years we have always worked with up and coming videographers and freely and willingly shared equipment, knowledge, experiences. This year we offered you the opportunity to film the race with us, offered equipment etc., but you never called or came back. You obviously were at the race and never once talked to us or approached us. We have no intention of trying to develop a monopoly on this event, the more publicity it receives the better for everyone, and we believe our DVD from last year has helped expose this race to potential new racers across the country.

[wildstormfilms]

This year we offered you the opportunity to film the race with us, offered equipment etc., but you never called or came back. You obviously were at the race and never once talked to us or approached us.

Ok you keep bringing this up. The reason I never got back with you guys about helping to film the race was because I was part of Waynes and his 2 daughters pitcrew. I can't commit to other projects if I'm busy with my friends.

This whole video promo deal: Wayne did not come to me about this. My friend and I had thrown this idea to each other since last year. We spoke to Wayne about it on Sunday (because I wasn't there on Saturday,) and he thought it was a great idea especially since the 60th anniversary is next year so we ran with it. He was very excited about the idea as is the other racers that I have talked to of trying to get a big network to come here and shoot the race, which is puzzeling to me at the fact that in your email to me, Maryellen Hagrel approached you guys last year about getting the speed channel to broadcast the race. And judgeing by the racers/club members reaction to my enthusiasm for doing this, they did not know that such contact was made to the speed channel last year. The racers are also excited that 7&4's Jayson Gieyser expressed interest on doing some coverage on next years race because, afterall, this is a big event and its been 60 years in the making.

Using under 2 mins of your DVD footage, I and a handful of others who are racers, thought this wouldn't be a big deal. We were wrong. I used the song "Breakdown" by Tantric for the trailer video because the song has a real upbeat tune to it. A race feel to it considering that this peice of music is on the "Driven" motion picture soundtrack. This song wasn't downloaded illegally or anything. I have the soundtrack that has this song on it and from my research on various amature and independent filmmaker forums, it is only condsidered "illegal" if I use this music or any type of music in a video and sold it for profit. This trailer is promoting a race to the fans. Not selling to the fans. If this was truely such a big issue, every youtube user would have recieved a cease and desist order for using copyrighted music tracks in their own videos uploaded to youtube or the admin on youtube would remove or cancel the accounts. Fact is, this has not happened.

I've said all I need to say and I consider this matter closed as I have honored your request.

[mike ross]

As a stock outboard member and a strong supporter of this race. I would love to see you two start working together on making the 60th anniversary of this race a big hit. Our family has enjoyed the fame of this race to the tune of about 28 wins here. My brother Tim won the race for the 11th time in a row this year. This has never been done by any boat racer. I am running for the stock VP position this year. At apba we have a great promotion video that is available to use. Lets put all our heads together and make this thing a hit. I hate seeing all these great ideas being knocked back and forth. The speed channel would be awsome to have do a piece on this race. We always talk about getting more people into the sport. When a great idea comes along we some how find a way to beat each other up for some reson or another. We sure are not doing it for the money as it was stated above. Have the Commador of the Top O Club get a meeting with all the above and get this back on track with out all the fighting for the good of the sport of stock racing. I know all will be proud when it is commplete and the efforts you all have put forward as a winning TEAM!!!!! shows on TV to a national audience. Mike