Super Cat

Key West, Ca. (Nov. 16th, 2001)

Tommy Bahama falls just seconds short of winning the Super Cat World Championships.

Tommy Bahama was propped too high and the Nemschoff duo struggled throughout the race in rough seas until the fuel load started to burn off. And for the second race in a row, their late race charge to the front fell short and again the Drambuie on Ice cat reaped the rewards.

The Weismann equipped cat performed flawlessly over the two race event and proved again that it is the class of the field. We will have to settle for second place this year.

There is always next year's championship!

Gainsville, Fl. (Nov, 11th, 2001)

Robert Giard wins the World Finals and his first Funny Bike Championship!

Privateer Robert Giard showed everybody that he is the new kid on the block by recording the fastest qualifying pass of the meet and winning every round to secure the Championship in style!

He set his fastest pass of the weekend on the final pass with a time of 6.59 sec with a speed of 181 mph - and he let off the throttle at the 1000 ft mark because it was "too dark!"

Calculating from the data slip of that final pass, had Robert stayed in it, he would have recorded an E.T. of 6.42 sec, which is 3 hundredths of a second faster than the World Record!

We congratulate Robert Giard and Bill Hahn on their great accomplishment.

Factory Kawasaki rider Chip Ellis was the favorite coming into the World Finals to win his first Championship but he was upset in the semi-finals and finished the season 2nd in the points.

BAJA 1000

Baja California, Mx. (Nov. 8-11th, 2001)

In a mad rush to help the Terrible Herbst Team with their automatic transmission failures, Chris and Pat Weismann created a new 6 Speed Offroad Semi-Automatic Transmission in just over 2 1/2 months from scratch.

The new gearbox had less than 2 days testing before it showed up in Baja in the Terrible Herbst Team's #1 Ford-powered Trophy Truck. Extremely fast, the truck was running 2nd overall in the early stages when they struck a rock damaging the steering rack and putting them effectively out of the race.

No problems at the first check point.

Four hours down and with nothing to lose, the race became a test session and the Tim Herbst ran the truck as hard as he could until software problems on the downshifts caught up with the truck in the slit beds and he got stuck putting us out of the race.

"When it's working, it's really incredible... it's just a matter of time. We'll have it right for next year."- said team manager Mike Smith after the race.

Coming in to fuel up at the second checkpoint.

Considering the lack of testing time, we are very encouraged with the run in the desert. We look forward to the first race next year in January to conquer the Score Trophy Truck Championship with the Terrible Herbst Team.

A lot of effort was put in to help us do the "impossible" once again. Our guys in the shop did a great job in making the parts correctly so that it all assembled together perfectly and Hardy Allen, Jim Kightlinger, Rene Weber, Ewen Honeyman and Tommy Peralta all stepped up and put in extra effort to help!

Mike, A.J., Vinnie, Tom, and Cooper on the Herbst team did a great job preparing the truck for our new transmission.

Super Vee

Key West, Ca. (Nov. 1st, 2001)

Ettore takes early lead in the World Finals, then crashes out of the race!

The legendary rough waters around Key West proved to be too rough for Jim Richardson and Scot Conrad and they were lucky to survive a frightening accident when their Extreme hull launched off a wave, tripped on the second, and then stuffed it into the third.

The canopy imploded into the cockpit smashing Scot in the face and breaking his helmet in three pieces! Scot was rushed to the hospital and later released. He's doing O.K. but he is pretty bashed up. The boat was damaged heavily and their Championship race was over on the third lap.

But before the crash, the West Coast racers Jim and Scot easily lead the 16 boat field through the first turn, showing the World for the first time it had the legs to run with the best in Super Vee racing. A little more race experience in Key West and they will be tough to beat!

Super Cat

Key West, Ca. (Nov. 1st, 2001)

Tommy Bahama races up to third place and runs out of time!

Again the rough waters around Key West played havoc with the racers and this time Tommy Bahama had a tunnel flap break early in the race and it hung down slowing the boat.

Eventually within laps of the checkered, it broke off and then Paul and Mark Nemschoff took off and passed up into 3rd place overall. A couple more laps and they could have won the race!

They will get another chance on the delayed 2nd race of the World Championships - the 16th of November.

Poker Run

Lake Mead, Nv. (Oct. 27, 2001)

Gary Smith (left front) is our first Poker Run customer. He has a '40 ft Skater with Double Whipple Supercharged Big Block engines. This cat ran 160 mph in the Lake Mead Hot Rod Poker Run blowing away everybody else on the lake until a blower belt came off. He finished the run on one engine at over 110 mph!

At the Lake Havasu Poker Run on Sept. 22, Gary also had the fastest boat.

What does he have that no one else has?

A set of our Dry Sump #6 drives.

Super Vee

Ventura, Ca. (Oct. 14, 2001)

Ettore Spins and Wins!

This race the officials started the vees with the cats and Jim Richardson and Scot Conrad rocketed to the first turn battling for the lead with the renamed Fountain Mercury '36 Skater Honker Cat!

After being chopped off by Honker Cat at the buoy, the Ettore vee let the cat Renegade by and ran a comfortable 3rd place for the first 2 laps!

With almost a 4 minute lead over the second place vee Team Woody with blower motors making an additional 600 hp and running in the Extreme Class, Jim and Scot backed off and let by the two cats Kidstuf and the Open Class '46 Skater How Sweet It Is.

Ettore leading Kidstuf.

The 5 boat pack left the rest of the field thru the 7-10 foot rollers an the occasional 12 footers. It was while cresting one of these huge rollers in a turn that caught out the Ettore vee and it did a complete 360 flat spin on the swell.

"We were racing pretty hard through the turns and as we came over the top of this wave in the middle of this turn, it spun around so fast that I wasn't to sure anything had actually happened. The boat was pointing straight and we took off again!", said Jim after the race.

Undamaged by the incident, the Ettore vee continued on to claim 1st place in the Super Vee race in it's second race!

Veteran boat racer and good friend Craig Archer was on hand to watch the race and he was very impressed with our new boat saying, "It looked very good!"

The next race - The World Championships in Key West, Fl.

Ready to attack the competition!

Super Cat

St. Pete, Fl. (Oct. 7, 2001)

Tommy Bahama wins!

It has been a frustrating wait, but Mark and Paul Nemschoff finally got to demonstrate what they knew they could do all year, and they destroyed the competition to record their first Super Cat win in the APBA National Championships.

But it was not a walk in the park as the Nemschoff duo missed a marker while leading and had to turn the cat around and go back round the marker. They then chased down the now leading boat of Cat Can Do and thundered past them to regain the lead!

In the 24 lap event, the sleek cat was never seriously challenged round the flat waters of St. Pete. Cat Can Do finished 2nd and Drambuie On Ice finished 3rd to secure the National Championship over Don Q.

We congratulate throttleman Johnny Tomlinson (Zerodefect) and the Drambuie On Ice squad on a well deserved championship.

and we congratulation the Nemschoff team on their first Super Cat win!

Trans Am

Houston, Tx. (Oct. 7, 2001)

Justin Bell wins his second straight Trans-Am race!

Rookie of the Year Bell won his second straight race and the second race of his Trans-Am career at the Grand Prix of Houston. Bell started the race in sixth place and quickly
worked his way up to fourth, then third.

On lap 56 of 60, Bell took second and with just two laps to go . . .

“I was behind Brian (Simo) thinking, ‘he’s led almost every lap, and that it would be rude of me to go by him now on the last lap', but then I came around and he got sideways and that was just enough for me to get by. I made a safe pass and Brian
backed off,” said Justin Bell after winning the race.

Justin won the last two races of the year in his rookie season in Trans-Am. He will be a force to contend with next year.

Trans Am

Laguna Seca, Ca.

Rookie Justin Bell grabs his first Trans-Am win at Laguna Seca!

From 6th place, Bell jumped into second place. as the race leader spun at bottled up the front runners. He then pitted and thanks to some fast pit work
and some quick laps, Bell took the lead as the race leader finally pitted.

Bell battled with a Brian Simo thru a series of full course cautions held off the field to score his first Trans-Am win!

“I’d say this is probably the best thing I’ve ever won.” - Bell in victory circle.

Justin Bell is no rookie when it comes to winning with our gearboxes. He won the 1997 GT2 World Championships in a Viper using the same 5 Speed Transmission.

Topeka, Ks. (Sept 22-23rd, 2001)

Johnny and Kurt Greaves win season finale!

The last two races of the year for the CORR Series were run at the Heartland Raceway and it was Johnny Greaves and Scott Douglas who had the trucks to beat.

The first race saw Johnny jump into the lead followed by Scott who barely keep the truck from rolling over in the first turn when he was hit by another truck. As Scott was looking for a way past, the reigning champ caught up to the dueling leaders and slipped past Scott. Scott had no warning that he was there as his radio wasn't working.

Scott tried hard to regain his spot only to have the handling go away in a big way as he fought hard just to keep the truck from flying off the track over the jumps!

Johnny ended up getting second place when the champ bumped his way past kept "clean driving" Johnny behind him to the checkered to secure the this year's championship.

But it was Johnny Greaves who won the one of the closest races and most controversial finishes all season. Johnny had the lead from the drop of the flag with Scott getting knocked back two places into 4th by the champ. As Scott passed up to 3rd, Johnny got bumped and passed by the champ going into a tight turn.

Two laps later Johnny dove cleanly down the inside of the champ in the same turn and shot back into the lead. As you can see from the back of the truck there was not much body work left as the champ proceeded to bump and tap Johnny in practically every turn trying to push his way past!

Scott's race for the win ended in a spin as he lost a front drive shaft after closing up on the leaders. Scott still raced on to finish the race.

It all came down to the last corner on the last lap. Johnny had already rounded the turn and was just accelerating towards the checkered when the champ T-Boned the left rear tire of Johnny's truck sending him sideways. The rear drive shaft was sheared clean off the back of our transmission, and Johnny crossed the checkered in 2nd with only front wheel drive.

Race officials were quick to make a command decision and the champ received his first ever Black Flag and Johnny was awarded the win! Everybody knew Johnny won the race fair and square and the champ proved to everybody he was not a champion.

Before the year started, many people told Johnny and Scott that our transmissions could never take the pounding without a converter to absorb all the shock loads. We rose to the challenge and came away with 4 wins.

"It was one of the few things on the truck that i didn't have to think twice about all year." said Johnny after sunday's race. In Johnny's rookie season in Pro-4, he won 3 races in style and Scott got his first win in over a year. Both drivers know they could have had more, and they will prove to be the trucks to beat next year.

Weismann Super Vee Drive Train

Thanks to the Ettore Team owner Mike Smahlik, Pat and Chris Weismann were able to recreate the overall drive train layout of Vee-Bottom boats and make what we think is the most radical improvement in Vee-Bottoms since stepped hulls!

To understand just what we have done it's easier to first explain how the current "state of the art" Super Vee drive train works, then we'll explain how ours works and the advantages we have brought forth.

Typically you will find that Super Vees run two #6 Drives, two in line F-N-R transmissions and two big block engines.

To obtain the highest straight line speed, the drives are mounted as close together as possible without the props hitting each other -around 20" apart. The input of the drives are around 19.5" up, and since in line F-N-R transmissions are used, the engine crank centers are up 19.5" from the prop as well. To avoid the headers of the engines interfering with each other, the left engine is "staggered" forward of the right engine and thus unequal length drive shafts are used to get back to the drives.

Now both engines rotate counter-clockwise, so the reactive torque from the engines rolls the boat over to the right or in the clockwise direction. Also since the engines are located 19.5" up, the boat has a fairly high center of gravity. Hence many Vee-Bottom boats roll over - especially to the right. Furthermore, #6 drives weight in around 500 lbs each, so the boat has a high polar moment, or in other words, the boat has a greater tendency to spin out.

Since the Ettore Team's boat from last year was heavily damaged due a roll over, they were keen to the possibility of something different and here is the drive train layout we made for them.

The first thing we did was to take the rear engine and spin it around 180 degrees so that it would rotate in the opposite direction relative to the front engine. We then moved them in line, flywheel to flywheel, and we placed them all the way down in the bottom of the Vee hull.

Since we also make F-N-R transmissions, there are two identical homologated transmissions that are not in line but are offset. Thus the drive from the front motor steps to the right side of the rear engine and the drive from the rear engine steps to the left side of the rear engine. To take the drive from the transmissions to the drives, we had some custom carbon fiber drive shafts made to reduce rotational mass.

Then we have our homologated MKII drives which have a 10.5" vertical offset from the input to the prop shaft and are 30% lighter than #6 drives.

The boat has a small polar moment and the center of gravity has been significantly lowered.

So what we've been able to make is a Super Vee boat that accelerates in a straight line with no steering input, corners better than any other boat ever has, and is safer to run at faster speeds thru turns without feeling like the boat is going to roll over or spin out.

An added bonus for a pleasure boat version is that we have been able to free up valuable real estate both above and along side of the engines!

We've tried to keep this new drive train design of ours secret for as long as possible, but we now know that some of our competitors know what we are doing.

We've decided to unveil it here on our website first before someone attempts to copy it and take credit for our innovation or worse yet, claim it to be illegal and try to have it banned before we get a chance to run it in the Worlds.

We don't intend to win the World's with this boat as we are only just getting it running now and we haven't been dialing it in all year long. But we do intend to show the World what we are capable of given an opportunity like the one that the Ettore Team has provided us.

Super Vee

San Diego, Ca. (Sept 16th, 2001)

Our bad luck continues as our new Super Vee suffered another strange failure with three laps remaining that took us out what would have been our first win.

The race started with the Super Cats getting a 1 1/2 mile head start over the Super Vee field, but it didn't take long before we had caught the Super Cats and began passing them on our way to the front!

When was the last time a Super Vee chased down and passed Super Cats?

Running 4th overall and 1st in Super Vee class, we were closing in rapidly on 3rd place Kidstuff when a shift linkage broke allowing one of the transmissions to jump out of gear.

It was a shame because the boat was really working so well, we had a 2 1/2 mile lead over the second place Conseco Super Vee of Nigel Hook seen in the background and were closing up on him to lap him!

We have one more race to work out the bugs before the Worlds, but we will be ready. Aside from the linkage failure, our Drop Boxes and MKII drives performed great throughout the weekend.

CLASS 2

Coews, England (Sept 2nd)

Jann Hillestad and Andreas Ugland raced their 2000 World Championship with our unique Semi-Automatic 2 Speed over the weekend in a time trials and two race event.s.

Jann and Andreas dominated all three to sweep the world's best in UIM Class 2 including the factory Buzzi boat! We have taken an existing Buzzi F-N-R gearbox and removed the internals, made some new parts, and have created a 2 speed semi-automatic to drop in place.

The sister transmission is still in this Buzzi Tri-maran which is the World Speed record holder. These are only two boats running semi-automatic transmissions in the world!

Except now Class 2 has limited us to only using one speed during the race and time trials- and we still won.

"If it's not banned - It's not a Weismann!"

-Phil De Ruyer

Our latest creation!

This is a F-N-R transmission that attaches directly to a #6 gimbal, then steps to a 1500hp T53 Turbine engine. The brake is to stop the turbine to enable shifting into gear. The forward gear ratio can be changed and the transmission is dry-sumped. Two of these have been made but they are mirror images of each other using the same components.

Pat Weismann designed these two gearboxes are for a 46' Skater with twin T53 turbines being made by Intech Marine in Ontario, Canada.

Super Vee

Huntington Beach, Ca. (Aug 19th, 2001)

The debut of the Ettore Super Vee was not quite what the team had hoped for as a mechanical problem took us out even before the race began!

It was a team decision not to risk damage to the new boat and one lap after taking the green, we pulled off course. The weekend was not all lost as we were able to get in some good testing and our drop boxes and drives performed flawlessly.

We are working the bugs out and we will be ready for the World Championships in Key West.

Indianapolis, In. (Aug, 12th, 2001)

Chip Ellis wins his 4th straight AMA/Prostar Funny Bike Final and ties Robert Giard for the championship lead!

It came down to our two top riders in the finals and Chip Ellis and Robert Giard were again the quickest and fastest Funny Bike riders at the meet. During qualifying the AMA/Prostar officials ran the final round from the Canada race and Chip beat Robert to the line for his 3rd straight final elimination round!

Between the two of them, they have won every single AMA/Prostar Funny Bike meet this year!

Chip ran his slowest R/T (reaction time .485 s) but his quickest ET (6.728 s) and his fastest MPH (208 mph) of the weekend to pass power past Robert thru the traps in the Pingel Thunder Nationals final elimination round to win his 4th straight win!

#2 in the points, Robert Giard runs our KZ3 which fits in the classic KZ1000 engine cases and #1 in the points Chip Ellis runs our ZX3 which fits in the modern ZX1100 cases.

The riders championship comes down to the World Finals in Gainsville, Fl., but it is Traction Products who has already won the Transmission Manufactures Championship!

World Debut

Benicia, Ca. (July 29th, 2001)

THE FUTURE IS HERE!

With only the APBA Super Vee class available for us to race our MKII surface drives in, we have stepped up to the challenge and the result is this gorgeous new boat for the Ettore Racing Team uses a homologated Extreme hull, Paul Pfaff engines, our homologated drop boxes, and our homologated MKII drives.

Mike Smahlik, Chris Smahlik, and Jim Richardson of Ettore Squeegees have been wanting to use our feared MKII drives after seeing them work on the Ragamuffin boat of Rique Ford last year.

After some hard work and some late nights, we put the boat in the water for the first time in Benicia, Ca. for it's initial shake down run.

The boat handled superbly as Chris and Jim got familiar with their new boat.

After a successful first outing with no leaks or any mechanical problems of any sort, Chris and Jim jumped out of the boat with smiles from ear to ear. They knew they had just been in the most technically advanced Vee Bottom boat in the world!

Mike Smahlik, president of Ettore Squeegees, looks very pleased as he gets his first look into the engine bay area.

The boat was expertly rigged by Dan McNamera and Tom Stagliano of Archer Marine.

We would like to thank Mike, Chris, and Jim for having faith in our abilities, and providing us with a boat to bring our banned MKII drive back into racing.

The boat will run it's first race in Huntington Beach, Ca. on Aug. 19th.

Ft. Dodge, Io. (July 27-29th, 2001)

It was almost a perfect weekend for the only two trucks with manual transmissions in the Pro-4 CORR race series. In the 3 races, Scott Douglas and Johnny Greaves using our 5 speeds 4WD gearboxes finished 3rd, 2nd, 1st and 1st!.

After completely altering the suspension setup on the truck, Scott showed the field he was a force to reckon with as he lead the first half of the first race easily until the track started to slip and slide as his tires lost grip. Scott's truck slid into second, but for the team, it was the best showing to date and the truck was working perfectly.

Johnny's first race ended early when a drive shaft came flying off his truck while making a turn causing him to lose front wheel drive.

But Johnny came right back in the second race by taking the hole shot into the lead. Johnny lead every lap until the last when a desperate late braking attempt by the 2nd place truck spun Johnny around breaking his front wheel drive again. Johnny crossed the line in 2nd but the new leader was black flagged as he crossed the finish for his reckless overtaking maneuver. Not the way he wanted to win, but Johnny deserved this win as he never put a wheel wrong throughout the whole race!

Scott's race ended before the first turn as a fellow competitor turn right at the first left turn and locked front wheels with him, breaking a stub axle on the other front tire. Every truck in the field suffered some kind of mechanical failure in that race!

After an exchange of words at the driver's meeting, it was back to racing.

Johnny got off to a bad start suffering a flat tire almost immediately and he cruised home into 3rd place. It was now all up to the number 12 truck of Scott Douglas.

Scott stormed into the lead at the drop of the green flag. But he was passed on the second lap by his main rival as he slid wide under breaking into a tight right hander. Determined to fight, Scott came right back the very next lap and passed into the lead in the same corner that he had lost it. Fortunately for him, his rival started to lose his engine and he pulled off the track.

But Scott soon had another truck to contend with, the one that crashed into him in the previous race. This time the racing was clean and Scott maintained his lead under a lot of pressure until the other truck developed a flat rear tire and faded back.

At the half way point Scott's lead was now more than half a lap and all he had to do was bring it home for the win. In a very satisfying fashion, Scott flashed across the finish line to the delight of the team and the crowd!

Since September of 1999, Scott hasn't been in the winner circle mainly due to automatic transmission failures. And against the advice from his competitors that our manual could never take the punishment of his powerful offroad truck, Scott made the command decision to switch to our manual 5 speed and in the last race of the weekend he proved he had made the right choice!

We congratulate Scott and Johnny on their rapid progress as between the two of them, they have won 3 of the last 5 races in CORR Pro-4!

Bark River, Mi. (July 14-15th, 2001)

Johnny Greaves smoked thru the Pro-4 field from last place to first to win his and our first race of the season!

At the drop of the green flag the truck didn't move. We had suffered our first failure this year, a broken fork rail! Greaves put it second and stalled it. After restarting it and getting rolling, the field was already thru the first turn and gone.

By the end of the first lap he had caught the field and started to work his way forward thru them. By the third lap he was in front and leaving the pack! Johnny cruised home to win our first Pro-4 race in style!

Scott Douglas had taken the lead in the first race only to have a Borg Warner transfer case pack up and lose front wheel drive. He finished a 5th with only rear drive.

Sunday's race started out good for both of our trucks as they rocketed off into the lead. Johnny had no problem coming off the line this time and was on the outside of Douglas as the two approached turn 3 with an eight second lead over the pack.

Johnny's front suspension broke as he landed off a big jump, and he spun right in front of a charging Scott Douglas, who was just going for his move past Johnny!

Scott had no where to go and just barely managed to plow right into the rear panel instead of the Johnny's cockpit! That slowed Douglas a little at he charged ahead in first for a few more laps until the Borg Warner unit gave up again, and Scott slid back to forth.

Carl Renezeder and his team, in an effort to pinpoint where they might be hurting performance, decided to take a step backwards and go back to an automatic transmission.

Considering that Carl had clearly the fastest Pro-2 truck and had won the last race leading into Bark River with our manual transmission, we are baffled by their decision.

However, we are pleased to report that Carl and his team finished 7th in the first race and 8th in the second race with their automatic!

Antigo, Wi. (June 9 & 10th, 2001)

Saturday morning started out great for our 3 new CORR Offroad Trucks as Carl Renezerder, Scott Douglas set the pace in morning practice. But then heavy downpours all weekend made conditions practically undriveable, and it was a survival of the luckiest to just finish the races.

In the Pro-2 race, Carl had a tough time seeing thru all the mud before breaking a power steering pump that ruined his chance at winning. Then in the second race, again mud accumulating on his visor blocked his vision and he drove off the course. He battled back thru the field to finish a strong 4th.

By the time the Pro-4 class was at the starting line the track had became very slick with a lot of standing water. Johnny Greaves had the pole and Scott Douglas was right next to him on the front row.

Johnny leading the pack into turn four, Johnny was centerpunched in the rear tire, flattening it and he was forced to pit. A lap down, he worked his way up to 7th.

Scott got pushed out into the mud puddles in turn one and finished the first lap in last place. He then starting picking off trucks and by mid-race was running in second.

Only two seconds behind the leader, four laps to go, lapping 2 seconds quicker than the leader, Scott saw the motor pressure suddenly drop and he had to shut it off. It could have been a great last to first win, but racing luck wasn't with us that race.

Sunday's Pro 4 race was no better for Johnny. His power steering pump broke again on the first lap as he was leading it from the pole. It was a disappointing weekend for the Johnny, but he knows he has a great truck.

Scott made a great start in second place, but was passed by another truck that appeared to leave before the green to everybody but the race officials. He battled hard and raced home to second place.

It was a great race for Scott Douglas and his team since this was the first race they finished with our 4WD 5 speed manual transmission, something all of the automatic transmission users in the pit lane thought they couldn't do!

Rockingham, SC. (May. 20, 2001)

Chip Ellis wins his 3rd straight Funny Bike Final!

Chip Ellis smoked to another win at AMA/Prostar Schnitz Racing Summer Nationals with our ZX3. On his way to the finals he was again #1 qualifier with a 6.687 s pass and the fastest mph at 208.33!

"Transmission is still alive!" exclaimed Steve Rice. "That's what we can really attribute to our success, the fact that we don't have transmission problems."

Robert Giard was #2 qualifier with a close 6.742 s pass and a mph of 197.71 and its was Robert Giard who unfortunately lost in the finals with a 6.834 s pass at 193.43 mph.

Super Cat

Ft. Myers, Tx. (May. 20, 2001)

Tommy Bahama blows away the competition only to slow near the end and then get disqualified!

In another unfortunate twist of events, the Nemschoff's managed to completely dominate a race only to have it slip through their fingers at the very end and finish fourth.

The team is remaining tight lipped about what the failure was, but we know that our radical Drop Boxes have completed 3 full race distances without a failure.

Post-race inspection showed that they had an illegal adjustable rev-limiter switch and they were disqualified, which is strange considering that Mark Nemschoff himself writes the rules!

Don Q finished a strong 3rd to maintain the 2nd spot in the Championship after struggling throughout the race from being over-propped.

Ft. Dodge, Ia. (May. 19, 2001)

After running a 4WD 5 speed with Rod Millen for two years, 3 more teams have made the switch from their automatic transmissions to our manuals.

In Pro-4, we now have Scott Douglas (above) and Johnny Greaves (below) using our 4WD conversion on our standard "Shuttle" 5 speed manual transmission.

In Pro-2, Carl Renezeder is using our standard "Shuttle" 5 speed manual transmission.

In the first Pro-2 race of the year, Carl Renezeder finished 2nd in this new truck. Carl and his crew Charlie, Frank, Jesse, John, and Ernst showed the have what it takes to win the Championship this year.

In the first Pro-4 race, Johnny Greaves jumped up from last place into 3rd by turn two, only to get rammed from the rear and put out off contention on the first lap.

Scott Douglas was just getting into his rhythm in 4th when he got rolled over on his roof for 2 laps, ending his chance at a win.

"It was a wild weekend, but we're real proud of the way the truck performed when it was on its feet," Douglas said. "We came into the weekend expecting to turn a lot of heads, and we certainly did that on Friday. Everyone was impressed with our new setup."

On Sunday, the races were canceled due to Tornadoes not the thunderstorms, and everybody got out of dodge, Ft. Dodge that is!

All three men have followed the first step into the future by counting on our ability to produce a transmission that is rugged enough to take the demands of offroad and provide a competitive alternative.

Super Cat

Daytona Beach, Fl. (Apr. 22, 2001)

Don Q almost wins the rough Super Cat opener at Daytona Beach!

Falling just 2 seconds short of beating the Drambuie On Ice Super Cat, Felix Serralles and Pat Patel battled rough water with an over-propped boat only to have the race come to them at the end and lose it.

Had the race gone the additional 3 laps that it was scheduled to be, they would have easily have won the race as they had reeled in 14 seconds on Johnny Tomlinson and Hugh Fuller just on the last lap!

Tommy Bahama led shortly before hurting a carburetor off one of these jumps and was forced to cruise for the rest of the race finishing 6th, a lap down.

This was the season opener and out of the 4 Drive manufacturers that were written out of the rules three months ago, we are now the only Drive manufacturer that is not legal to run in APBA Super Cat.

The Tri-maxx is on the Tommy Bahama boat, and uses our F-N-R Drop Boxes.

The Arneson is on the Honker Cut Super Cat than ran in Oceanside.

And the BPM is on the new Pier 57 Super Cat. The boat showed up on saturday morning around 4:30 am and had never been in the water. It is the same design boat as the Tommy Bahama, but with BPM Drives and Drop Boxes, and made by Fountain.

The BPM drive has never even raced in APBA, yet they were allowed to race on sunday!

The Don Q Super Cat is now allowed to run our 7 year old Dry Sump #6 drives because Don Q won the US-1 National Champion with them,

but only for this year.

(May 9, 2001)

We lost a close friend this week.

"The legendary Smokey Yunick has gone the "Big speedway in the sky!" smiled Hardy Allen, looking up as if he could see him up there.

We were fortunate to have had the chance to work with him in 1973 at Indianapolis where he had created some of the most innovative cars in racing's history. His cars have dominated both Indy and Nascar.

You know the templates they use in Nascar to check the bodies? It was because he had made a 7/8 scale Nascar!

He was the first to create an offset chassis for the ovals!

And what Pete Weismann created for him was nothing less than what is now the most common transmission configuration used in Formula 1 today!

This is Pete's longitudinal 4 speed spun around 180 degrees to improve the polar moment of the car similar to the transverse designs that would follow soon after.

The trouble is that if you want to change gears or ratios, you need to split the car in two to get to them. Then you have to realign the car afterwards. This was fine if you were not the mechanics!

And Pete said that was the last time that he ever do this configuration!

Racing has lost a true pioneer.

AMA/Prostar

Houston, Tx. (Apr. 22, 2001)

Chip Ellis continues his winning streak in record style at the AMA/Prostar Houston Cyclefest!

Chip was #1 qualifier with a 6.613 s pass and the fastest mph at 212! Bryan was #2 qualifier with a 6.662 s pass and a mph of 204!

Robert Giard was #3 qualifier with a 6.681 s pass and a mph of 202.

Nobody else was even close!

But it was Chip who got out of the gate first with a reaction time of .479 s and a low 188.70 mph thru the traps. Chip laid down a personal best E.T. at 6.591 s to beat 3x Funnybike Champion Bryan Bennett!

NMRA/Prostar

Phoenix, Az. (Apr. 15, 2001)

Chip Ellis dominated the Funnybike field at the NMRA Arizona Challenge to record his first win of the year! Chip beat Scott Valentine with an 6.781 sec E.T. and a top speed of a 191.43 mph!

In it's 7th year, our original ZX3 is still going strong!

The water offshore is starting to boil!

(2-25-01)

There is an excellent article that came out yesterday on speedvision.com that is focused on the controversy APBA has created surrounding the recent rule changes. Please take a moment to click on the following link and check it out.

Drive-ing Super Cats - APBA Changes The Rules

Then please come back to check out the responses on the message board of OffshoreOnly.com. You can see how the offshore community and APBA are reacting to the article.

Speedvision Article Feedback

Super Cat 2001 Rules Released

Out-smarted and out-classed, Mercury scrambles and pays for a monopoly in APBA's premiere series, Super Cat! - and just 3 months before the start of the season!

Tony Esposito of Mercury Racing commented for speedvision.com,

"We paid dearly for it."

Quotes from the message board of APBA:

Ryan Beckley asked Mr. Allweiss,

"Where does this leave Weismann?"

"No Weismann. Mercury #6 only."

Michael D. Allweiss, President of APBA Offshore (Feb. 11, 2001)

Effective for 2001, the Mercury/MerCruiser SSM VI, known as the #6 drive, will be the only drive accepted by the APBA for Super Cat, except for the existing Tommy Bahama and new Pier 57 boats.

The amount of the Mercury sponsorship was not disclosed, but Mr. Allweiss is proud to announce that they have secured over $1,000,000.00 in sponsorship money for the first time ever!

But here's the catch,

it will be the Mercury customers that will ultimately foot the bill!

You now have to buy Mercury #6 Drives to comply with the new rules. When the new lower unit comes out, everybody will have to buy those. And Mercury's maintenance program can only be performed by Mercury.

Of course, there are the minimum rebuild costs, labor, overhead, shipping, new parts, and spare parts.

Mr. Allweiss had good intentions by wanting to emulate Nascar. But instead all he did was create a series as exciting as IROC! The prices will go up because there won't be any competition in the market place.

U.I.M. CLASS 1

Multi-Speed Transmissions banned!

The governing bodies of Class I World Offshore ( U.I.M., W.O.C. and I.O.T.A. ) met on Dec. 2 2000, and have decided to ban multi-speed transmissions in 2001 and in 2002!

In a closed-door meeting with NO transmission manufacturers, the representatives of the top three teams argued their cases. All three had different ideas about what should be done for the future of the sport, and neither of them wanted to bend from their plan. It was Mateo Nicolini who suffered the most from transmission failures last year, and it was his proposal that won in a final vote of 7 to 5 - after the two previous votes that came out 6 to 6!

So, for the second time in 4 years, and in the top two Offshore racing series in the world, multi-speed transmissions are banned!

It is no coincidence that it was our multi-speed transmissions that dominated the seasons leading up to the bans!

To us this is a mind-boggling step backwards in the evolution of boats! We have proven that multi-speed transmissions are the quickest, fastest, cheapest, safest, and most fuel efficient solution for the entire sport! It even enables diesel engines to compete against gas engines!

It is a decision that has upset the Victory Team the most.

The Victory Team hadn't won a championship - since they last worked closely with us - and after winning the 1995 and 1996 World Championships, the U.I.M. changed the engine rules and our package was obsolete!

For three years they struggled to find the winning combination, and in 1999 we got back together with the Victory Team to take this revolutionary diesel engine/ multi-speed transmission package of ours and create the most advanced race boat in the world.

The Victory Team won the World Championship in 1999 and 2000 with our Drop Diesel 4 Speeds,

and now the U.I.M. has banned gearboxes!

Is this racing ?!

It seems that we keep getting banned or legislated out because we provide our customers with the best ideas we come up with and our competition cannot compete.

1995, 1996 U.I.M. Class 1 Offshore World Champion

Weismann "Dry Sump" #6 Drives

1997 U.I.M. changes the rules.

The companies affected by the changes - Weismann Marine, Sterling Engines and the Victory Team.

The only boat affected - Victory 1.

Sterling Engines quit racing in U.I.M.

1996 US-1 APBA Offshore World Champion ( 11 for 11 wins )

Weismann "Dry Sump" #6 Drives and Weismann 3 Speed Gearboxes

1996 APBA Modified Offshore World Champion

Weismann "Dry Sump" #6 Drives

1997 APBA bans Multi-Speed Transmissions and Non - OEM manufactured "Dry Sump" drives.

The only company affected by the ban - Weismann Marine.

The only boats affected - Zerodefect (renamed Nomad for the Worlds) and Ragamuffin.

Team Zerodefect quits racing in APBA.

2000 Details about the new Weismann Surface Drive gets out.

2000 APBA changes the rules mid-season.

The only company affected by the change - Weismann Marine.

The only boats affected - Ragamuffin and the uncompleted Tommy Bahama.

2000 Weismann Surface Drive MKII debuts and wins!

2000 US-1 APBA Super Cat Offshore Champion

6 year old Weismann "Dry Sump" #6 Drives

2000 Weismann FnR Drop Boxes debut and dominate the Worlds.

2001 APBA bans the Weismann Surface Drive and all shaft drives!

Forest Barber (Drambuie on Ice), the most respected racer in APBA, has quit rather than start over!

He was having a new Platinum Power Boat built with BPMs and our FnR Drop Boxes.

1999, 2000 U.I.M. Class 1 Offshore World Champion

1999, 2000 U.I.M. Class 1 Offshore European Champion

1998, 1999, 2000 U.I.M. Class 1 Offshore Time Trial Champion

Weismann Drop Diesel 4 Speed Transmissions

2001 U.I.M. ban Multi-Speed Transmissions.

The companies affected by the ban - Weismann Marine, Victory Team, and Team Jotun Ugland.

The only boat really affected - Victory 1.

AMA/Prostar

The AMA/Prostar officials have made a decision to keep Electric Over Air shifted transmissions legal!

We appreciate all of you riders that came forth and convinced them that this would have been the worst thing they could have done to the sport!

SCCA Nationals

Phoenix, Az. (Jan. 8, 2001)

Andy Porterfield started the 2001 season like the way he did in 2000, he won! This might seem like no big deal, but Andy will be 70 this year!

Fresh from winning last year's championship with 11 wins, Andy was back in front again showing the way for the younger guys !

Unfortunately in practice for the second race, Andy got together with another car going into turn 1 and backed it into the wall pretty hard.

"We had no time before the race to fix it right, so Dennis (Lyman) did his best fixing it and I went for it." recalled Andy.

Andy scored a 4th with his ill-handling car, and is leading the championship race!

"The gearbox shifted great. I never once had to think about it!", exclaimed Andy.

5 Speed "Shuttle Box" Transmission.

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