event and we quickly learned that the
competition in each class was extremely
stout. Heat by heat, we watched as the
racing was intense with a good majority
of the boats finishing each heat. We
zoomed right along and had done nearly
40 heats by lunch time. Our club
provided racers and their families with
lunch from Chick-Fil-A. We ended up
having an extended lunch due to some
unforeseen issues with our buoys and
race course. Once we got rolling again
we were able to run all 80 heats plus all
the shootout classes and trophy
ceremony, still managing to have the
racers out of the park by 6:45pm. We all
then gathered for dinner at “Cattle
Baron” and enjoyed many more stories
and laughs.
Sunday morning was a tough early
call for a few racers who decided to
enjoy some of El Paso’s night life rather
than preparing for an early wake-up call.
We started racing and put the pedal to
the floor. We watched some of the best
racing I’ve seen in years. We rocked
through 86 heats of intense racing,
handed out trophies, raffle items and tore
down the whole race site by 5:00pm.
There were so many great racing
performances over the weekend.
However, we have an award called the
“Eli Karagich Award for Excellence”
that is awarded to the racer who displays
the most dominating performance of the
event. Dale Roberts won the first annual
award and Robert Holland won the
second. In 2013, there was no denying
Continued on page 16
PROPWASH
October 2013
15
The West Texas Shootout For Autism Awareness
By Jay Stone
Rio Grand Racers
The Desert Southwest often
offers an oasis of sorts to weary
travelers. A mirage of water off
in the horizon often keeps
travelers on their journey.
Holding up to the stigma of the
Desert Southwest, El Paso and
the surrounding areas are now
facing drought situations of epic
proportions. The Rio Grande
River lies dry most of the year
and receives very little water flow which happens only at certain times. Luckily, the
West Texas Shootout is held at Ascarate Lake in El Paso, Texas. Ascarate Lake is a
county owned lake that is fed by underground wells that keep water levels up and offer
a true racing oasis in the southwest.
Racers joined us from all over once again in 2013. El Paso’s newest hobby shop,
Star City Hobbies was our title sponsor and helped us graciously welcome NAMBA
racers to the Star City. Racers from California, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado,
Texas and Japan joined us once again for a weekend of awesome racing. In fact, 57
racers and 237 boats took part in the event. Not a single heat was easy. In fact most
stacked up as a “who’s who” of model boating.
Open water took place on Friday, April 26 starting at 7:00am. Open water
continued on until 4pm when the racing action was kicked off by the Gas Team
Marathon event. There were 4 teams entered in the event and the team of Scott
Grissman, Stan Stallings, Corky Daily and Dale Roberts took the win! The team of
Lenny Blake, Susan Osendorf, Russell Stark and Al Waters came in second, however,
with the efforts of pitman extraordinaire, Lenny Blake, they almost caught up despite a
complete engine change. The racers then later gathered for “Happy Hour” at my suite
at the Hampton Inn. We all enjoyed many laughs and a few adult beverages before
heading over to dinner at “The Lunch Box” restaurant.
Saturday morning racers gathered and enjoyed breakfast provided at the race site
by our club. After our drivers meeting we kicked off the heat racing portion of the
Star City Hobbies along with many other sponsors contributed to the “Shootout”
Hiroyuki Okuma, more commonly known
to everyone as “H”, made the trip from
Japan