Ebay Bahama's 500 Race Article

[Bushwacker]

Originally Posted by 76Red18

Cool man..Was Chet Strickland driving a SeaCraft or a Magnum? Article says 21' SeaCraft came in 3rd. Results at bottom shows 3rd was a magnum. Can't have any media bias against SeaCraft now can we..

Richard and Tim,

I found the 1 page I had kept out of the 1967 Yachting magazine with the race results and more details on the boats. The 3rd place boat was a 27' Magnum, No. 46, named "Lightning", driven by Chester Strickland, at an average speed of 38.3 mph. The 8th place boat was a SeaCraft 21, No. 41, named "Joan I", driven by Gene Wagner, with an average speed of 34.3 mph. 9th place was also a SeaCraft 21, No. 31, "My Flying Machine", driven by Carl Moesly, with an average speed of 31.7 mph. 14th place was another SeaCraft 21, No. 43, named "Hurricane", driven by Steve Sirois, from Miami, with an average speed of 18.0 mph.

Wonder if Carla can tell us how many SeaCraft 21's were entered in that race? I'm guessing it was only 3!

That SI article really conveys how rough that race was on the crews as well as the boats! To have all 3 stock production boats even FINISH in a race so rough that it literally destroyed 75% of the fleet (of mostly specially built race boats), speaks VOLUMES about how well Moesly built those old 21's! For them to AVERAGE over 30 mph in those conditions with only 220 hp also says a lot about their performance in rough seas! Wagner's average speed was within 2-3 mph of the 27 & 35' Magnums running 900-1000 hp! The next closest outboard to Moesly, the 23' Formula "Yellow Bird" was over 7 HOURS behind, with a 22.4 mph average! Denny