MISS MADISON,
THE GOLD CUP CHAMPION - PART I
By Fred Farley - APBA Unlimited Historian
No one who attended
the fabulous 1971 APBA Gold Cup Regatta in Madison,Indiana, will
ever forget it.
That was when MISS MADISON, the world’s only community-owned
and sponsored Unlimited hydroplane, confounded the oddsmakers,
winning the race of races before the hometown crowd.
The MISS MADISON’S richly sentimental
triumph on that memorable July 4 was an historic one on several
counts. Not since the 1965 Dixie Cup at Guntersville, Alabama,
had the sun-bleached MISS M scored a victory. It was pilot Jim
McCormick’s first win ever in the Unlimited Class. The MISS
MADISON was built in 1959 and first entered competition in 1960,
thereby making her the only Unlimited hydroplane ever to win a
Gold Cup eleven years after its competitive debut. Not since mandatory
qualifications began in 1949 had a Gold Cup winner placed lower
than fourth on the qualifying speed ladder. (MISS M was seventh.)
The 1971 event
also marked the first and only time that a community-owned boat
has ever won the Gold
Cup. Not since 1966 had the American Power Boat Association’s
Crown Jewel been won by a boat with Allison--rather than Rolls-Royce--aircraft
power. The MISS MADISON of 1971 also represented the end of an
era. (She was the last Unlimited hydroplane with the old-style
rear cockpit/forward engine/ shovel-nosed bow configuration to
ever achieve victory.)
The hull that became the Gold Cup-winning
MISS M was designed and built by Les Staudacher of Kawkawlin, Michigan.
Staudacher had previously constructed such successful contenders
as MISS PEPSI, GALE V, TEMPO VII, MISS THRIFTWAY, and HAWAII KAI
III. The future MISS MADISON measured 30 feet in length with a
12-foot beam. Made of marine plywood and aluminum, she tipped the
scales at close to 7000 lb. in racing trim.
The craft made
its competitive debut at the 1960 Detroit Memorial Regatta on the
Detroit River. She
was called NITROGEN TOO at that time and owned by Industrialist
Samuel F. DuPont of Wilmington, Delaware. The TOO was a teammate
of DuPont’s original NITROGEN, another Allison-powered Staudacher
creation, constructed in 1957.
Driven primarily
by Ron Musson of Akron, Ohio, the NITROGEN TOO performed no better
than average in the
early part of the 1960 campaign, running well behind the speedier
boats of that era. Still, she performed well enough for a nomination
to the United States Harmsworth Challenge Team along with her sister
ship and with Joe Schoenith’s GALE V. In the Harmsworth International
Race on the Bay of Quinte at Picton, Ontario, NITROGEN TOO led
the first lap of the Second Heat, posting a speed of 123 miles
per hour on the 5-mile oval course. This was only 3 mph under the
world record set by the Canadian defender and eventual Harmsworth
winner, MISS SUPERTEST III.
At the 1960 Silver
Cup in Detroit, NITROGEN TOO won a surprising and impressive victory,
beating the favored
MISS THRIFTWAY and averaging 101.919 miles an hour for the 45-mile
distance. Leadfoot Ron Musson would not be denied, leading MISS
THRIFTWAY pilot Bill Muncey all the way in the Final Championship
Heat. The DuPont team’s triumph was all the more remarkable,
considering that MISS THRIFTWAY used the more-powerful Rolls-Royce
Merlin engine. NITROGEN TOO, on the other hand, ran a basically
stock Allison power source.
At season’s
end, NITROGEN and NITROGEN TOO had tied down second and third positions
in the 1960 National
Points chase behind MISS THRIFTWAY in a field of 29 boats. In addition
to her Silver Cup achievement, the TOO had taken second place in
the Madison Regatta and third in the Buffalo Launch Club event.
In 1961, Sam DuPont withdrew from competition
and donated the older NITROGEN to the city of Madison, Indiana.
The name was changed to MISS MADISON, Graham Heath of Madison became
the Crew Chief of an all-volunteer crew, and Marion Cooper of Louisville,
Kentucky, signed on as the driver.
The original
MISS M took a fifth in its first race, the 1961 Detroit Memorial.
Later in the season,
the team scored a hard fought victory in the second division Seattle
Trophy Race at the Seafair World’s Championship Regatta on
Lake Washington. The following year, Cooper and Heath and company
took fourth in the Spirit of Detroit Trophy and third in the Indiana
Governor’s Cup.
In 1963, the first MISS MADISON ended
its career where it had begun--in Detroit. During trials for the
Gold Cup Race, MISS M was completely destroyed and pilot Morlan
Visel was seriously injured.
Not to worry, the city of Madison was
not about to lose its floating chamber of commerce for very long.
The Ohio River townspeople already had another hull, the NITROGEN
TOO, waiting in the wings, which had likewise been acquired from
Mr. DuPont.
The “new” MISS MADISON, which
was to become a racing legend, made its initial appearance in competition
at the 1963 Madison Regatta. She placed fifth in the Indiana Govemor’s
Cup, driven by George “Buddy” Byers of Columbus, Ohio,
a champion 7-Litre Class pilot.
The craft had
a big year in ‘64.
She gave an extremely consistent performance that allowed her to
finish second in the National Point Standings. And although she
didn’t win a race, MISS M ran better than in her initial season
as NITROGEN TOO. She was runner-up in the Dixie Cup at Guntersville,
Alabama, and the Dakota Cup at New Town, North Dakota. MISS
MADISON also took third place in the Diamond Cup at Coeur d’Alene,
Idaho, the Seafair Trophy at Seattle, and the President’s
Cup at Washington, D.C.
And everywhere she competed, MISS M
served as the best ambassador of good will that the tiny Mid-Western
town had ever had. Indeed, the city of Madison became a household
word from coast to coast, thanks to the fast-moving U-6, her intrepid
driver Buddy Byers, and her masterful Crew Chief Graham Heath.
In 1965, the
MISS MADISON racing team posted its first major victory with a
102.746 mile an hour come-from-behind
triumph at the Dixie Cup. MISS M entered the Final Heat on
Guntersville Lake with two second place finishes in the preliminary
action. Sprinting toward the starting line, Byers realized that
he and the other drivers were too early and in danger of “jumping
the gun.” Buddy eased off on the throttle and wisely resisted
the impulse to follow when the rest of the field thundered past
him. Sure enough, front runners MISS U.S. 5, NOTRE DAME, and TAHOE
MISS all crossed prematurely and incurred a one-lap penalty. Byers
backpedaled to a legal start, cruised to an easy victory, and wound
up with 1000 accumulated points, 73 more than the second place
finisher MARINER TOO, driven by Warner Gardner.
For the balance
of the 1965 campaign, MISS MADISON generally failed to show the
consistency or the speed
of the previous year. Exceptions to this summary included the U-6’s
l06 mile an hour heat at the Seattle Gold Cup and her second place
overall finish in the San Diego Cup.
Jim McCormick
of Owensboro, Kentucky, made his Unlimited Class debut as driver
of the community-owned
entry in 1966, replacing Buddy Byers who had signed on to drive
Bill Harrah’s TAHOE MISS. By this time, Graham Heath had also
left the team to accept the position of Crew Chief for Jim Ranger’s
new Detroit-based MY GYPSY organization.
The reorganized MISS MADISON team had
a mediocre year at best in 1966 and had difficulty qualifying for
Final Heats. Their highest finishes were a third at the Tampa Suncoast
Cup and a fourth at the Madison
Regatta.
Following a reduced
schedule of races in 1967-68 with Ed O’Halloran of Detroit, Michigan, as driver,
the craft improved on its 1966 performance but was simply not the
contender she had been under the helmsmanship of Buddy Byers. The
highest finish during the O’Halloran years was a second place
in the 1967 Suncoast Cup on Tampa Bay.
In 1969, the
now experienced Jim McCormick returned to the cockpit. But even
with the change in drivers, the
boat’s performance did not improve. A third at the hometown
Madison Regatta was the team’s highest finish. Indeed,
the glory days of 1964-65 seemed light years away.
MISS MADISON almost missed the 1970
campaign entirely on account of being involved in a highway accident
in Georgia while enroute to the first race of the season in Tampa,
Florida. Pulled off the circuit, the stricken craft underwent repairs
by original builder Les Staudacher. In retrospect, the mishap was
probably a blessing. Staudacher used the occasion to go through
the entire hull and fix several things in addition to the highway
accident damage that might otherwise have gone unnoticed.
The end result was an improved contender
when MISS M returned to action a month later. Had the National
Championship been determined that year solely on the results of
the five races that the MISS MADISON did enter, discounting the
three that she missed, the team would have finished fourth instead
of sixth.
MISS M defeated
the highly regarded Tommy “Tucker” Fults and PAY ‘n PAK’S
'LIL BUZZARD in Heat 1-B at Madison, which was a surprise. The
U-6 also
showed a lot of class--and a definite increase in speed -- when
she and McCormick trounced the favored Bill Muncey and MYR SHEET
METAL in both Heats 1-C and 3-A of the season-concluding San Diego
Gold Cup.
At year’s end, MISS MADISON was
running the best of her long career and giving the better-than-average
performance that was expected of her. She could make the front
runners work for it and could run with them on occasion. But the
general consensus at the outset of 1971 was that only a newer hull
and more power would put the U-6 team in the winner’s circle.
Nevertheless, the MISS MADISON organization decided to stay with
their eleven--going on twelve--year old craft for one more season.
The 1971 campaign
started with a new race, the Champion Spark Plug Regatta, on Biscayne
Bay at Miami
Marine Stadium. MISS M was leading in both of her preliminary heats
but was forced to drop back on account of a fuel mixture problem
in section 1-A and a faulty supercharger in 2-B. Not to be
denied a spot in the finale, the volunteer crew members proved
their mettle by performing a complete engine change in less than
thirty minutes. Pilot McCormick then proceeded to take second spot
in both the Third Heat and the overall standings behind Dean Chenoweth
and the MISS BUDWEISER.
MISS MADISON
continued in the Champion Regatta a resurgence that had begun in
the last race of 1970. No
longer was the U-6 thought of as a slightly better-than-average
boat that was merely along for the ride. The MISS M was now
regarded as a viable contender. However, the team was still short
on money and horsepower, and most people still refused to take
the community-owned boat seriously.
Moving on to
the President’s Cup
contest on the Potomac River, MISS MADISON won her first two heats
convincingly. She defeated the likes of Billy Schumacher in PRIDE
OF PAY ‘n PAK, Leif Borgersen in HALLMARK HOMES, and Billy
Sterett, Jr., in NOTRE DAME, each of which had a millionaire owner
and used the more powerful Rolls-Royce Merlin engine.
Prior to the
finale, MISS M and Jim McCormick were not an illogical choice to
win the race, based upon
their strong showing in the preliminary action. Charging into the
first turn of the Championship Heat, however, the U-6 was hosed
down by the roostertails of HALLMARK HOMES and the eventual winner,
ATLAS VAN LINES I, handled by Bill Muncey. McCormick managed to
restart and take a disappointing fourth behind HALLMARK, ATLAS
I and MISS BUDWEISER, although he managed to overtake and outrun
PRIDE OF PAY ‘n PAK by a wide margin.
The MISS MADISON
team won the overall second place President’s Cup trophy for 1971 and had the satisfaction
of running both the fastest 15-mile heat and the swiftest 45-mile
race of the contest. But driver McCormick was bitterly discouraged.
He had missed victory by a scant 31 points and was beginning to
wonder if winning a race wasn’t perhaps an impossible dream.
In the Kentucky
Governor’s Cup
at Owensboro, MISS M did not improve on her two previous performances,
taking an overall third behind ATLAS VAN LINES I and PRIDE OF PAY ‘n
PAK. The U-6 challenged MISS BUDWEISER for the lead in Heat Two,
but otherwise her performance was undistinguished.
At the Horace E. Dodge Cup in Detroit,
MISS MADISON ran head-to-head with Terry Sterett and ATLAS VAN
LINES II (the former MYR SHEET METAL) in the First Heat, despite
rough water. On the last lap, Sterett moved ahead of McCormick
and maintained this advantage to win by three boat lengths.
In the Second Heat, MISS M broke down
and recorded her first DNF (Did Not Finish) of the year. Consequently,
the U-6 was ineligible for the finale. Still, MISS MADISON was
running the best of her almost ended career.
The Thunderboat
trail now led to Madison, Indiana, which was steeped in a competitive
tradition that dated
back to 1911. As things developed, the city’s 60th boat racing
anniversary story would have amazed a fiction writer. No publisher
would have accepted a make-believe script on the race.
For the first
time since 1951, the Indiana Governor’s Cup shared the spotlight with the APBA Gold Cup,
power boating’s Crown Jewel, which had never before been run
in so small a town as Madison. Due to a technicality and a misunderstanding,
the $30,000 bid for the race by the sponsoring Madison Regatta,
Inc., was the only one submitted in time to the Gold Cup Contest
Board.
For ten years,
the volunteer MISS MADISON mechanical crew had tried to win the
hometown race without success.
They faced an uphill fight in 1971, and they knew it. In the first
four races of the season, MISS BUDWEISER and ATLAS VAN LINES I
had both scored two solid victories apiece. ATLAS VAN LINES II,
a five-race winner in 1969-70, was likewise a formidable contender.
(Having been her team’s number one entry during the three
previous years, the II’s performance had suffered little in
her secondary role with Terry Sterett in the cockpit.)
Also not to be
overlooked in the pre-race figuring at the Madison Gold Cup were
the HALLMARK HOMES, the NOTRE
DAME, and the PRIDE OF PAY ‘n PAK.
HALLMARK was having a difficult season
but nevertheless had championship credentials, being the former
1967-68 Gold Cup and National High Point-winning MISS BARDAHL.
NOTRE DAME, a virtual copy of the HALLMARK
HOMES, had a reputation as being a fast competitive boat, although
she had never won a race.
PAY ‘n PAK was likewise having
an uneven 1971 campaign. The PAK sported a radical new design.
She was wider, flatter, less box-shaped, had a pickle-forked bow
configuration, and had performed admirably on occasion. The craft
had experienced a disastrous 1970 season, but there were a few
who staunchly believed that if PRIDE OF PAY ‘n PAK ever had
the “bugs” ironed out of her, she would revolutionize
the sport, and render obsolete all of the top contenders of the
previous twenty years.
Several days
before the race, Jim McCormick placed a crucial telephone call
to Reno, Nevada. He requested and
obtained the services of two of the finest Allison engine specialists
in the sport--Harry Volpi and Everett Adams of the defunct HARRAH’S
CLUB racing team--who flew to Madison and worked in the pits alongside
U-6 regulars Tony Steinhardt, Bob Humphrey, Dave Stewart, Keith
Hand, and Russ Willey. Volpi and Adams are credited with perfecting
the MISS MADISON’S water-alcohol injection system.
Next
>>>
Copyright © Fred Farley
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