Upcoming Appearances and Awards
Where 007 Will be This Year:
This year will be a trip down memory lane at the Tahoe Concours. It seems impossible, but 50 years has gone by since Glory Beale and her father decided that it would be fun to invite a few friends to bring their "old woodies" to the Chambers Landing dock for a little friendly competition for bragging rights and some fun. The current Lake Tahoe Concours d'Elegance evolved from that very casual first wooden boat show into what many believe is the premier wooden boat show on the West Coast, if not the entire United States.
By 1974, wooden boating and boat racing had declined from its Glory Years in the 1940's and 1950's when races between Henry Kaiser, Stan Dollar and the other pioneers of the sport at Lake Tahoe regularly drew thousands of spectators to the two annual regattas held at Tahoe Tavern and Chambers Landing. But, the 1974 revival rekindled interest in displaying, although not racing, the wooden treasures at Lake Tahoe. The 1981 movie classic "On Golden Pond" further whetted the public's interest in wooden boats, an interest that has, fortunately, persisted to the point that thousands of spectators flock to the Tahoe Concours annually.
The Tahoe Concours crowns an "Overall Best of Show" winner each year based on notoriously stringent (and sometimes mysterious) judging criteria applied by a cadre of experts. The Award has become the holy grail for some uber-competitive wooden boat owners. Show organizers are making a valiant attempt to gather as many of the 50 previous winners as possible to the Show this year. It should be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see the "best of the best". I highly recommend that you take this opportunity to see wooden boat royalty.
Although 007 is NOT a former winner of the coveted trophy, she WAS a part of the racing heritage at Lake Tahoe as an important member of the Henry Kaiser stable of race boats during the Golden Years at the Lake. So, this year, 007 will be among her racing family at the Show; I hope you can stop by for a visit. And, as usual for an inveterate gear-head like me, I will start her beautiful Hemi engine regularly so you can enjoy the best 1950's music. See you there!
Last Year:
If you feel that you are still "lost in the 60's", you would have LOVED last year's Concours event at Lake Tahoe! Fins, lots of turquoise and orange paint, and even some shag carpet adorned the "Boats of the 1960's" on display at Obexer's Boat Company.
And although 007 is not a boat of the 1960's, her rakish gold dorsal fin and black faux crocodile upholstery definitely fit right in! In fact, in many ways, 007's design set the stage for the outrageous designs of many 1960's boats.
And when I started up the engine so the crowd could hear (and feel!) all that Hemi horsepower accompanied by 50's Gold music in the background, it was better than magic mushrooms!
Recent Awards:
2022 was a very special year for Chris Craft boats at the Tahoe Concours. After a layoff from live shows due the COVID epidemic, the Tahoe Concours was back with a great line-up of Chris Craft boats, celebrating the marque's 100th anniversary.
007 had just finished a two year restoration during COVID, so expectations were high! 007 did not disappoint as she won:
First Place in Marque Class
"There is Nothing Else Like It" Overall Award
-from California Porsche Dealers
Although it is always satisfying to win a class award knowing that the judging at the Tahoe Concours is very tough and done by a set of experts in each boat category, the second award 007 won might be even more satisfying. Who would appreciate excellent design and engineering more than a group of Porsche dealers?
Judging at the Tahoe Concours is Notoriously Stringent
As we mentioned above, Judging at the Tahoe Concours is notoriously difficult. The standard is "as delivered from the factory", and the judges seem to know the "correct" size and location of every single screw on every boat. Scores are determined on a 0 to 100 point scale, and as far as I know, there has NEVER been a 100 point boat (Nadia Comaneci has not arrived in the Tahoe boat judging world!).
The judging problem for 007 is that the boat was owned, and modified for racing, by one of the most famous families, the Henry J. Kaiser Sr family, in Tahoe history. To undo the modifications put in place by the Kaisers would be, in effect, erasing history, and the current owners refuse to do that.
To give you some idea what that means, we have shown below the official judging worksheets from the 2022 Tahoe Concours, where 007 earned a First Place trophy with a score of 93.5 points (out of 100 points). Keep in mind that all the work on 007 was done by well-recognized restoration experts and advised by THE recognized expert in Cobra boats. Still, because of the owners' decision to keep the historical aspects of 007 intact, the boat was only able to score a 93.5. The deductions for historical changes made by the Kaiser Family include: Line 32 (1.0 points), Line 42 (0.25 points), Line 93 (3.0 points), Line 114 (0.5 points), totaling a deduction of 4.75 points.
What this means is that this historical boat begins the competition at a ceiling of 95.25 points, NOT 100 points as do her competitors. In a competition where mere tenths of point are often the difference between winning and losing, a 4.75 point hurdle is simply insurmountable. Since 007 scored 93.5 points in total, she was only 1.75 points from perfect not considering the Kaiser historical alterations, normally close enough to be in competition for overall Best of Show consideration.
The owners of 007 are happy to live with this ceiling on Concours scoring, because the historical provenance is much more important for this particular boat than taking it back to simple "showroom standards", but this does expose an important flaw in the current Concours judging protocol that needs to be addressed in order to lure more historic boats into Concours shows for the public to enjoy.
