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The history of the 28 footer is rich with many victories in offshore racing all over the world. The story begins in 1965 with Don Aronow, who had
beaten the competition with his new design, DONZI, that was 10 feet wide and 28 feet long, designed by Jim Wynne and Walt Walters.
The following year, 1966, the World Champion Jim Wynne had used a custom built 28 foot wooden boat made in secret in England ... GHOST RIDER
. It was powered by twin turbocharged motors that gave it a top speed in the high 80's for short bursts. The strategy that Wynne used was to
burst out in front of the pack and then throttle back to mid 60's speed until he was challenged again, then he would use the turbos and get out in
front again. The boat was so successful, it was undefeated in every race it ran in America, Europe and the Bahamas.
By this time Don had sold DONZI and started a new company with designs by Harry Schoell. With his new company, Magnum, he decided to try a
narrower beam boat, 8 feet, but using the same length, 28 feet. He rigged two identical boats for his World Championship bid that year, 1967. One
boat had three of Mercury's biggest outboards and the other was powered with a single big block sterndrive. Compared to the GHOST RIDER, these were very simple boats.
By the end of 1967, Don was the new World Champion and the new 8 foot beam, 28 foot long design was the talk of the offshore world. Don
immediately launched the customer version of the boat as the Maltese Magnum. His production boats were powered with twin small block sterndrives.
The following year, as defending World Champion, Don continued to use the 28 by 8 design in defense of his title.
When Don sold Magnum and moved on to found Cigarette, he remembered how great that 28 by 8 foot design was; so he just used the same hull
design with a new deck design and called it a 28SS. This design immediately began winning the production class races all over the world, further building the legend of Don Aronow.
We humbly expect to carry on and further the use of this time-proven design in high speed offshore powerboating. We, too, will use the same hull
design and change the deck design by paying tribute to the great Flat Deck racers of the past, the Top gun and the Apache powerboats.
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