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2007 HARMSWORTH TROPHY |
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The Harmsworth Trophy was up for grabs at the last Coulon Park race of
the season. A fleet of 32 boats packed the pits at Gene Coulon Park for a wet,
breezy, partly sunny, and fun filled day. Thanks to Bill’s Bodacious BBQ and Bill
McGraw for sponsoring and coordinating the race. They sure put on a heck of a race! Division 2: 14 boats showed up for
action. A handful witnessed problems that they would eventually work out. Mike Schultz’s Griffin Bud was the first to show signs of difficulties when it ran
under the north walking pier. Dale Schroeder and his ’76 Budweiser completely charred a speed control before racing even
got underway. Danny Minalia handed over the 74
Pay’n Pak controls to his son, Tony.
Receiver and speed control problems
kept the boat on the beach, unable to compete in the Consolation Heat. Other
boats that did well but hit some bumps were Mark Beatty’s Beacon Plumbing, which flipped over in one heat. Brent Hall did not finish one of his
heats after stuffing the Coors Dry again, but his Bubble Bud ran well for much of the day. Steve Dumanis had his Shakey’s
Special were out and running
again. He and Danny Minalia now have
their rookie starts out of the way. Good
job guys! Pete Schille, with his “Lobster
Boat” Winston Eagle, looked good on the course. Dave Sacry and the Circus Circus
ran very well all day. Jeff Howard’s squealing Appian Jeronimo was a front runner too Mike Krone’s Design 360 is a quick
little bugger and continued to show what it had to bring to the party. Clint Crain’s Coors Light handled the
Coulon waters in fantastic fashion.
That, along with very smart driving, paid off for Clint at the end of
the day. Going for a 3-peat was Mitch Dillard’s unusually quick and usually
well handling Trendwest. However, after winning its first two heats,
the Trendwest suffered an unexplainable glitch in the backstretch, causing it to
dart sharply to the left and into the path of a charging Design 360. Fortunately, the 360 was able to continue on
with minor damage. Trendwest was DQ’d
but would run well for the rest of the day from the trailer position with
patched holes and without most of her rear wing. The only two boats not in action were Dale Van Wyk’s Cooper’s Express and Tony Minalia’s Smokin’ Joe’s. Dale is
experiencing problems and Tony is waiting on decals. They both plan to be at the next race. Final Heat: This was a battle of the big
boys. Making their way to the final were
Dave Sacry’s Circus, Pete Schille’s
Winston Eagle, Mike Krone’s Design 360, Clint Crane’s Coors Light, and Jeff Howard’s Appian Jeronimo. Trendwest advanced to the final by winning
the Conny from the trailer position. The
rain really started coming down just in time for the final, but the water
conditions were still pretty good. In the first lap, the Winston lead, followed
by Appian. Design 360 went dead at the
point buoy in turn two on the first lap, putting the Circus in third place. The Appian overtook Winston and roared up the
backstretch. Somehow the disabled Design
360 was struck by the Appian as it rounded the corner. Jeff was unable to avoid running up on to the
dead boat and would be DQ’d from the heat.
Neither boat was seriously damaged, but the Appian’s lead was
relinquished to the Winston who was following close behind. The Winston lead was short lived as he would hit
a hole, slightly hook to the inside, cut the exit buoy and inherit a one-lap
penalty. With the Winston down a lap,
the Appian DQ’d, and the Design 360 dead, first place was taken over by the
Circus Circus. Meanwhile, the Trendwest
closed the gap and was making its presence known with two laps to go. In third was the Coors Light. “Battery” Dave was determined not to succumb to
the pressure and negotiated the final corner, avoided the obstacles without
much delay and brought the Circus Circus home for the win! CONGRATULATIONS
to Dave Sacry with his first ever career victory as a driver in CT racing. Way to go Dave!!! Mitch Dillard took
home 2nd from the trailer spot, but has to be happy after having sustained
serious damage to the hull in a previous heat. Congratulation also goes out to Clint Crain
who drove his Coors Light to a 3rd place finish. His best ever
finish in division 2 racing! Division 1: 18, count ‘em, 18 boats
showed up for battle. We saw very close competition all day long with very few
problems. Excellent driving
everyone! We saw the first run ever for Jeff Howard’s 1967 Parco’s O-Ring Miss.
It looks to be a very good replacement for his two time champion, Miss Budweiser. Brent Hall has his Miss U.S. back and out on the water. Another new boat we saw was Dan Clark’s brand new “Green Dragon” 63 Miss Bardahl. Dan is
still trying to work the bugs out of it. But for its first race, it did pretty well,
and it looks fantastic. A whole fleet of
red boats were awaiting their chance to go out and show their stuff too. Leading them was the Timex driven by Mark Beatty.
He had a swell day and kept his composure and just finished his heats. Another
hard charging red boat was the Berryessa
Belle driven by Tony Minalia.
This kid just doesn’t know what slow is. In two of his heats, he went deck to
deck with the other boats and did it on the inside, somewhere he hasn’t raced
much in his past two seasons. Tony made a powerful comeback in heat 3C,
starting 4th and working his way up to 2nd. He then went a little hot into turn one,
couldn’t quite hold the lane and bumped into Mike Krone’s Miss Seattle Too. The Seattle Too had minor sponson damage, but
went on to have a good day. Her sister
ship, Miss Seattle driven by Dale Van Wyk had problems early, but
finally showed her championship form in her last 3 heats of the day. Mike Schultz is improving with his ’63 Thriftway. Clint Crane is showing he’s still a quiet, but strong force on the
water with his Parco O-Ring Miss. Mariner Too and Dave Sacry had a good day, finishing and scoring in all of his
heats. Dale Schroeder’s Notre Dame showed
a lot of boats its transom and made a really good showing. Dale’s other boat, the Valu-Mart,
is a very strong contender in the points race this year, but got upside-down in
this race. Pete Schille is trying to
get back to his winning ways with good finishes and clever driving. Bob VandenAkker decided to keep his Notre Dame at home and run one of his
other boats, a new Jeff Campbell built Nitrogen
Too, which ran very well. The world famous “Kroney” gearbox in Mike Krone’s Dutchman had one slip up
all day but ran very fast and kept the points rolling. Mitch Dillard once again had his seemingly unbeatable Slo-Mo-Shun IV running red hot. Final Heat: Very little time was wasted
after the division 2 final. The rain was still coming down and the wind was getting
worse. Thankfully, the water conditions
were holding out. We moved quickly to
the Division 1 Final. In this one we had
Pete Schille’s Pizza Pete, Bob’s
Nitrogen Too, Mitch Dillard’s Slo-Mo-Shun IV, Jeff Howard’s Parco O-Ring Miss,
Mark Beatty’s Timex and Dale Schroeder’s Notre Dame. Dale Van Wyk’s Miss Seattle advanced to
the final by winning the Conny. This one
was a doozy. On the first lap in the back stretch, Mark’s Timex barrel rolled
on to her lid. A lap later, Jeff’s
Parco’s whipped around and went dead by the entrance pin. Schroeder’s
Notre Dame seemed to have trouble handling the chop and Bob’s Nitrogen Too
worked his way past into third. In the
front of the pack were the Slo-Mo and the Seattle. Van Wyk had been driving like a mad man from
the trailer spot and had made up a lot of ground. No real moves were made till the last turn.
Mitch took a jump on lap four, giving up some distance. The Seattle closed the gap. The entire final
lap, the Seattle moved closer. In the
final turn, Mitch swung a little wide. The Seattle had a chance and made her move.
Dale wasted no time and stuck right to the buoy line. The Slo-Mo kept up enough
boat speed on the outside, came off the corner clean and held off the Miss
Seattle by only a few feet. Dale made a
great effort, but didn’t have quite enough time to get there. Mitch won his 3rd race in a row, but
the Miss Seattle and others are starting to show their swagger once again and
might have something to show Mitch’s Slo-Mo in the next few races. The final
order of the division 1 final showed Slo-Mo IV 1st, Miss Seattle 2nd,
and Nitrogen Too finishing 3rd. The 2007 Harmsworth Trophy
race was one to be remembered. We would like to thank once again, Bill McGraw
and his father’s restaurant, Bill’s Bodacious BBQ for sponsoring and
coordinating the race. Let’s continue
the fun and do it again on June 3rd. It will be race #4 at Lake
Morton in Covington. The prize will be the Presidents Cup. Till then, stay safe, keep the shiny side up
and the fires to a minimum. -Tony “The Kid” Minalia
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