Photo courtesy of speedonthewater.com
We love to reminisce on all of the fun we’ve had in the past. Almost a year ago, John Tomlinson sat down with Speed On The Water to discuss some of his most memorable moments on the water as well as the impressive work that he has done for the offshore boating industry. Continue reading to learn more!
During a Florida segment of the Powerboat magazine Performance Trials in the mid-2000s, John Tomlinson and Bob Teague showed me exactly how hard you can turn a 44-foot MTI catamaran at 140 mph. Tomlinson was driving, Teague was throttling. And somehow all three of us found ourselves rocketing toward skinny water in Sarasota Bay.
Teague stayed on the power and Tomlinson cranked a right turn so hard that the centrifugal force pinned me to the port gunwale.
Once back in deeper water, Teague shut down the cat’s 1,200-hp engines and we gathered ourselves. And by “gathered,” I mean we stared at each other in silence for a moment before the laughter started, though we later discussed our collective loss of situational awareness.
I could tell John Tomlinson stories all day, from boat-testing tales—he once stripped down to his skivvies to hop in the water and help pull a 23-foot Baja off a sandbar in that same bay—to his remarkable offshore racing success. I even played Blackjack alongside him at the Bluewater Casino in Parker, Ariz., during the Powerboat Performance Trials one year.
Full disclosure? Tomlinson isn’t just a great friend. He’s the finest person I know in the high-performance powerboating world.
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Original article published on speedonthewater.com
