[njsteve]

Just traded emails with Rick as he was wishing me a belated happy birthday. Here is an excerpt from his email. He is such an amazing mensch: [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/biggthumpup.gif[/img]

<span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="font-style: italic">&quot;On December 10th of this year I'll be 80 years old.

On December 19th Lenora and I will be married, to each other, 49 Years.

In August of 1973, when I took delivery of Samarkand, I was 38+.

In March of 1963, my team and I finished 4th overall in a Grand Prix motorcycle race at the Daytona International Speedway. We ran against the likes of Mike the Bike Hailwood who handily blew us into the weeds. Incidentally, he was personally a great guy and undoubtedly the greatest motorcycle racer who ever lived. His accomplishments are legendary. At that time I was 28+.

In 1964 we set the record for the circumnavigation of Long Island by a single engined outboard race boat. As far as I have been able to determine, the record stands to this day. Many bloggers, to this day, say our rig was dual engined but can't seem to find the second engine in any of the plethora of photos that were taken at the time. The picture taken as we crossed the finish line headed up all the ads for the Teleflex Corporation for over a year. At that time I was 29+.

In 1965 we won first overall in the Lake Michigan Regatta running a Glastron V-234 powered with a pair of 409 Chevys running thru MerCruiser Sterndrives. At the time I was 30+&quot;</span></span>