Dude! Sweet!

They're up in Northern Nevada. I'll ask around.

flying fish

All I can trace so far BT is the attached from 1973 San Francisco race where he came 6th.

Black Tornado

It seems really to be the same -Australian- American Eagle of my post #133
This of 1973 puts me another doubt on the existence of two or one Cigarette 36' American Eagle of the 1973....

pete60

That's definitely the American Eagle which came to Australia in 1978 and stayed.

The candy striped American Eagle (36 Cigarette) was imported by Arnold Glass in 1974 and enjoyed a long racing history in Australia until about 1988.

Black Tornado

And I believe that was that the Cig.36' that originally it was only painted of light blue with the long air intakes in red and that also raced in Europe in the 1973.

flying fish

Looks like there were 3 boats.

Light Blue 36ft Ciggy (European races)

Candy Stripe 36ft Ciggy

35ft Flat tailed version of 36ft Ciggy customed built and referred to as American Eagle built.(Where does Dan Arena come from BT)

Have pic of Candy Stripe in Bahamas 500 & Hennesey Key West.

Have pic of 35ft in San Franciso plus reference to it in Ensenda.

Crouse book says 36ft Ciggy used in Rio & Punte & Hurricane Classic races.

He also states 36ft Ciggy used in Bushmills although another report says a self styled cigarette was used.

Hennesey California & Catalina just say Aeromarine engined boat,although the Hennesey Key West says Mercruiser powered.

flying fish

Innerspace used in Europe & U.S. until Aug19th Hennesey race,where I have pic of baby blue 36ft Ciggy.Catalina unknown mount.Miami - Key West refers to baby blue ciggy used.So from all that assume candy stripe was only used for 1973,but what races other than Europe,who knows,he had a chioce of two 36ft ciggys.

Black Tornado

Thanks to the precious info from flyng fish,Pete60 and 7xChamps the Gentry's boats in 1972-73 are the following;


-Innerspace Cig 36' - from Miami-Nassau October 15 1971 to Viareggio-Bastia-Viareggio July 23 1972.Then sold to Mondadori(first race Dauphin D'Or August 6)


-American Eagle Cig 36' light blue - from Hennessy Cup August 19 1972 to Dauphin D'Or August 5 1973 (according to Richie then the boat come back in Usa and sold becoming a pleasure boat).


-American Eagle Cig 36' light blue and candy stripe - probably only US races in 1973. Then sold to Glass in 1974-first race Hennessy Cup? August 24.


-American Eagle 35' custom(Dan Arena from HORBA site) red-plum - from Long Beach-Ensenada April 14 1973 to July 15 1978. Then sold to Haines.

Black Tornado

It would be interesting if Richie could tell us if this 35' originally it was a Cig 36' then cutted and with a new deck or derived by a mould built under Cigarette license.

7xchamp

Hi Marco: The Dan Arena boat has been written about by me in past forums, but I`m happy to tell you. There were two of the Dan Arena boats built. One was silver Metal flake the Other was Red metalflake. The red boat was raced, I think one time pror to me, then I raced the boat in Australia, where it delaminated and we sold her on the spot to John Haines, who fixed her and raced her until she came apart again. The second boat Silver stayed in my North Miami shop for the longest time as a hull and deck only, never rigged that I know of, I think it went with Bob Beich when he moved the shop to Hawaii. The boat was not licensed from Cig. or anything like that, the bottom was generic 35` Cig. that everyone copied , only TG decided to put a flat on the keel, it was about 12 to 14 inches wide and probably 20 feet from transom to bow. I never ran the boat in that configuration, I think Freddie Miller ran the one Calif. race with TG in the boat and said it was terrible, that the flat ski gave the boat to much tail lft and pushed the nose down, which was not good for a cig. type boat. When Freddie prepped the boat for Australia he bolted an aluminum V onto the keel to make it conventional 24 degree V again. The boat was good enough to win the Mercury Trophy race in Australia under the most brutal conditons I had ever encountered in offshore. Hope all this helps clear up lost facts. I think Rudy Ramos of Rayson craft ski boats was involved in the project, as I remember visiting his shop to see the first boats, not sure if there was a mold or not as Dan Arena had a way of building without a mold, I think there was probably only a plug. As I viewed the pix of TG I notice one running next to Dry Martini, which was me and Bonomi, had to have been 72 or 73 probably 73. TG always had the badest boats, first Patterson headers etc, The sound of the motors used to scare half of us, only trouble he never finished until we teamed up in 1976 and won the UIM worlds, and won a record number of races doing it in the 35` cig. American Eagle.