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Mobilemercman and Martin Sanborns boat

Did not have a boat then was a little busy.In picture Adam now 17 and Jenna Ryan and Eric just turned 13.This was in the same envolope so it was probably about March 1998.


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I was just chatting with Jim and Martin. I'm sure they'll have some comments about the boat as soon as they see this....
 
Tim, The pic of the motors is not of that boat. One can verify by the engine hatch. The F2 had split hatches and the other motors had a single like a canopy superV.

Any way thanks for posting. That boat was fun to run.

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I was lucky enough to drive that boat for Martin on back to back race days in Toronto and Manhattan back in 1998. To this day I have never been in a boat that handled and turned as well as that thing did and thank goodness. In the Manhattan race Chip and the Hustler had just passed us in a turn and then spun out directly in front of us. Still not sure how we did not T-bone them but I am sure it had something to do with the fact that you could turn the Fountain hard and it would not miss a beat. Now, Christine on the other hand....
 
Yes, the two were very different. In fact Christine and Parts runner, both Lightnings were different too. I raced both of them as well as Another Fountain a Fever. All were different. The Matco boat was the best of the bunch hands down... Something Magical. I was lucky to have raced it during 3 seasons.
 
MOBILEMERCMAN said:
Yes, the two were very different. In fact Christine and Parts runner, both Lightnings were different too. I raced both of them as well as Another Fountain a Fever. All were different. The Matco boat was the best of the bunch hands down... Something Magical. I was lucky to have raced it during 3 seasons.
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Christine was a real dangerous boat. We figured the deck was too heavy and that contributed to the inbalance, particularly in tight corners. We won the first time out in it but she wanted to high side through every corner. The second time we were in a battle for the lead and she did a full 360 in a turn! We figured out the boat was not really capable of running up front without endangering the crew so the next race we pulled off the edge and ran top four until the very last corner of the last lap. We pushed the envelope again just to stay in fourth, the tail slid out and we hit a wave broad side causing Adib to fly out of the boat because the bolster was not fitted to him properly. That was the end for us.

I gotta tell ya, Jimmy, I prayed for you guys every time you got in that thing after we got out and nearly croaked when you crashed in St. Pete. I have no idea where that boat is now but it should have a giant disclaimer on it - DANGER - DO NOT TURN!!!
 
Even Parts runner needed to be finessed around a turn. I told Dee I was getting tired of third place. Every time we went out we pushed it further and closer to the edge.

BTW it was not a spin it was a snap roll that put us in the water. The boat continued toward the turn buoy where I pointed it.. We just were not in it any more.

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We were real lucky that day.
 
MOBILEMERCMAN said:
Even Parts runner needed to be finessed around a turn. I told Dee I was getting tired of third place. Every time we went out we pushed it further and closer to the edge.

BTW it was not a spin it was a snap roll that put us in the water. The boat continued toward the turn buoy where I pointed it.. We just were not in it any more.

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We were real lucky that day.
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You guys were lucky. I actually viewed all of the footage after the wreck and agree the boat snap rolled, however, what we saw was that the boat started to high side and tail slide and because of the heavy wake traffic the boat snapped and rolled rather than spin out. Unbelievably violent crash. Had we encountered the same wake/wave action in either Fort Myers or Corpus we probably would have suffered the same fate.

As for the finesse thing I could not agree more, except unlike Martin, Adib believed in letting the driver do all the finessing!
 
I don't know that they are any different.. Martin never lifted for me. The initial line I took was compromised when I crossed his wake. I drifted out a lane or two catching the boat before I could re initiate the turn. I had actually bailed on the turn. I knew it would not turn any harder. In the moment I decided to let it drift through the spray.

If you saw the footage Where we we in relation to the rooster tail? I expect we were in front of it. Possibly the rooster through the boat in the air. I recall Richy Rich saying he saw us 10 feet in the air upside down as we fell out of it.
 
MOBILEMERCMAN said:
I don't know that they are any different.. Martin never lifted for me. The initial line I took was compromised when I crossed his wake. I drifted out a lane or two catching the boat before I could re initiate the turn. I had actually bailed on the turn. I knew it would not turn any harder. In the moment I decided to let it drift through the spray.

If you saw the footage Where we we in relation to the rooster tail? I expect we were in front of it. Possibly the rooster through the boat in the air. I recall Richy Rich saying he saw us 10 feet in the air upside down as we fell out of it.
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Jimmy,

I raced with both. They had very, very, different syles, but each was very successful. The fact is that you and Martin had a lot of seat time in Fountains. Adib and I came out of the Nor-Tech which was a completely different boat. We probably ran the Fountain too hard before we really knew what it would do and that led to our problems.

I have not looked at the footage in 10 years but may still have it somewhere in all my boxed stuff. I do know that Richy Rich was prone to exaggeration, however. The boat did not fly out of the water 10 feet. As I recall, during the high side/slide, the boat actually encountered a wave/wake and snap rolled as a result, not too dissimilar to the accident that killed Jack Stoerle several years later. The saving grace for you and Martin was that the bolsters were not very tight allowing you all to fly away rather than getting caught underneath as the boat rolled. Sadly, Jack got trapped in the boat as it rolled over and skidded on the deck.
 
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