Kay Harrison collection

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I found a notepad I kept. I didn't start taking notes yet for race coverage for my photos or a story. Harry Echols taught me a lot, but I didn't have any Journalism skills at all then. I used the notepad to record a brief summary of what happened at a race for reporting to the IRS.

This brought back memories. I don't recall what the trouble was with one cylinder in the A Konig, but I remember B Hydro very well. It was a surveyed mile and a quarter course. I broke out into the lead and was never challenged. I had a big lead, and was runnning all out. I saw Dan kirts go wide in the bottom turn of lap three, and as I was lapping him, I figured his motor was not doing so well and just making laps to finish. I took the inside track. Just when I got into the turn, Dan turned a quick left to hug the center pin and knocked me into the bouy. It was like he never even saw me. I don't think he did it on purpose, it seems like he just picked out a line to close on the center bouy and slide out on the exit pin. For some reason my motor died, and Dan kept going. I never mentioned it to him and I don't think he ever knew it happened.

C Hydro is self explanatory. A good race.

D Hydro I got a good start. It was a restart from Jerry's accident. Nobody realized how serious it was yet. I had a good lead, but on the front straight about halfway down on the second lap my motor started to vibrate very seriously. I instantly backed off, confused. I applied the throttle again and big time vibration. I sensed lower unit problems, but something was different. I had never broken off a propeller blade before, but that's what is was.

F Hydro, first up. Good start, big lead. Front straight beginning the third lap the motor just quit. Coasted to a stop. No sense or a fuel problem, lower unit OK...just quit. We had a 10 gauge stiff wire for a ground to the motor. The recoil of small waves echoing the wakes off the island made a washboard of ripples along the front straight. All that jittering up and down of the stiff wire broke off at the terminal at the motorl.

All rememberd from a little note pad.

[racingfan1]

Thank you for posting these Wayne. I know this is a thread on Kay's collection, but it is good to close out the story of this race. I've always referred to these years, 50's, 60's and early 70's, as the glory days of Outboard racing and looking at the names in the results how could anyone argue!!!!!

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Thanks Dale. 1972 was also a time of transition. Only a month earlier at Gravois Mills AOF sanctioned a race called the Gulf Canadian Series. The first big AOF Pro race. About 20 or more of us met , I think in Ralph Donald's room. We discussed which way we should go. rather than divide up, we should stick together and have one strong organization instead of three splitting up the teams. The NOA was going down, AOF was upcoming and APBA was solidly established , though not in much of the south. We wanted to see what AOF was about, and although they put on a good race that was well attended, they had just started up. Nobody knew how long it would last, so except for the midwest most of us chose to go to APBA and let NOA collapse. How wrong we were about AOF. It has been around now longer than NOA existed.

Kay Harrison was at that meeting and was a big supporter of our experiment at Hot Springs. It is no wonder that he was one of the founders of USTS. So let's see some more of Kay's collection.

[racingfan1]

Here is a recap of the 1965 Eastern Divisionals. The first post will be the lead up to the race and the following post will be some of the results.

[racingfan1]

The C runabout results.

[racingfan1]

X Hydro scoresheets

[racingfan1]

C-1 Runabout scoresheets

[racingfan1]

C Hydro scoresheets

[racingfan1]

B Hydro scoresheets

[racingfan1]

D Hydro scoresheets