MERCURY RACING 600SCi
Grateful.
I am grateful for my new Mercury Racing 600SCi that we put in my 21-year old boat at the beginning of the year. Grateful that I finally have a reliable, powerful engine package that has allowed me to enjoy boating again.
After years and years of chasing the almighty "horsepower" thirst by way of custom engines that promised way more than they delivered, I finally came to my senses and went the route that the majority of happy, satisfied performance boaters have gone. I went Mercury Racing-power.
I must have a high tolerance for frustration and grief, because it only took two decades to come back to where I started. When we first built my 2002 LaveyCraft 2750 NuEra vee bottom, it was with a MerCruiser 496HO engine... and it was great! It was love at first launch and that combination never let me down. Except for when other boats with more power would pass me on the water like I was standing still. Thus began my elusive quest for more power.
Back then, the Teague Custom Marine supercharged 800 was my holy grail. The bling on that package was undeniable and even the pictures on their ads would have me daydreaming for one daily. But my budget was limited at that time, so I went with "other" custom builders. Let's just say that I've made far better decisions since then.
Of course there were times when the boating trips would be enjoyable but they were inevitably short-lived, and frustrations soon emerged.
Last year, after yet another catastrophic engine implosion, I had had enough and decided conclusively that reliability was far more valuable to me than the couple more mph I had previously yearned for. So, after consulting with several knowledgable people, I bought the Mercury Racing 600SCi. Engine-building guru and dear friend, Bob Teague of Teague Custom Marine had offered to install it for me and so my road to "pleasure boating" was finally about to be repaved.
The project was completed around Christmastime 2022. So, immediately after the holidays were over, we went to Lake Havasu, AZ to run my brand-new engine. From first startup, I could tell that this was going to be a different experience for me. The rumble of the sterndrive engine evoked goosebumps immediately. Essentially being down almost half the horsepower I previously had at 1100hp, the difference in torque and midrange power was hardly noticeable. the boat ran great and all areas of its performance had improved. But the comfort, confidence and peace that I felt was immeasurable. And priceless. (see previous blog)
So THANK YOU, Mercury Racing for putting the "pleasure" back into my pleasure boating again. And congratulations on 50 Years of Excellence and Innovation! #wideopen
My Time with Mercury Racing
Fred Kiekhaefer
My relationship goes back a long way. I came along in 1947 - 8 years after my father started Mercury. As soon as I was old enough, I worked at Lake X (summers during high school). There, I learned to rig and drive race boats. I hung around with boat racing greats like Odell Lewis, Dave Craig, John Bakos, John Steinbeck and Bill Sirois (to name a few). In 1968, After years of pleading with my dad, I finally raced with Bill Sirois. We won the Hennessy Cup, Around Long Island Race. Racing again with Bill, we finished second behind Odell in the Gateway Marathon from West Palm to Freeport and back. I was hooked, but assigned to Mercury Engineering, where it was safer. In 1969, my dad had a fight with Brunswick’s chairman and quit. (My Mercury door closed, too.)
After engineering graduate school (UW Madison), I worked for my dad at Kiekhaefer Aeromarine Motors (KAM) designing snowmobile engines and offshore racing engine components. When our snowmobile engine customer quit the snow business, I went to Northwestern’s business school. While on another career path in business consulting, my dad passed away in 1983.
I purchased the assets of KAM and kept his business alive. We made gearcases for Mercury Racing and Outboard Marine as well as our own line of marine accessories (K-Planes, propellers, zero effort controls) and racing components (gears, shafts gearcases). In 1988, we introduced “Sterndrives by Kiekhaefer” which Don Johnson and Bill Sirois drove to win the Superboat World Cup Championship. In 1989, Peter Markey won the same event with our drives.
In early 1990, Brunswick chairman, Jack Reichert, dispatched some strategy guys to see if I would sell my company and run Mercury Performance Products. After seven years of KAM growth and a reasonable offer, I agreed to sell. While we were negotiating, David Jones became President of Mercury which he renamed Brunswick Marine. Reichert said, “You can’t change the name!” By then the Aeromarine sale was complete. I reported to David, aka “Captain Chaos.” With Reichert’s permission, I changed the name from David’s “Brunswick Performance Products” to Mercury Racing. “What customers want on their shirts.” Our drives won again in 1990, but were called Mercury Racing #6 drives (next in sequence from the problem plagued #5’s).
About the same time as I rejoined Mercury, Brunswick restructured into “Focused Business Units” and Racing was one of them. Racing had been in a public relations and marketing role for “Mother Mercury.” As a focused business, with profit and loss visibility, its losses stood out. We had no choice but to become less generous with sponsorships and give-aways. We had to be a valuable contributor to Brunswick in order to exist.
That was a culture shock to Racing. A transformation was required. Some couldn’t cut it; others rallied with contributions. To some chiding, I introduced a green flag as our symbol of commitment. In motorsports, the green flag says “GO” and I wanted everyone at Racing to “go as fast as you can” toward our agreed goals, while staying within the limits of their capabilities, so as to avoid a crash. The metaphor seemed to resonate. Racing turned the corner through efficiency, new products, improved quality and a fully engaged team.
Racing expanded the former Aeromarine plant near Fond du Lac, Wisconsin and consolidated Oshkosh operations out of its leased facility. We introduced new direct injected 2-stroke outboards. We introduced a line of supercharged big blocks. We added digital Zero Effort controls. Racing developed diesel 2-strokes for the government. We made a 350 Verado 4-stroke. When the Stillwater facility was closed, Racing geared up to make the lower volume MerCruiser engines. In perhaps our boldest advancement during my tenure, Racing engineers created the quad cam, four-valve V8 sterndrive engine platform (QC4v). It had so much power and torque, we had to quickly develop the M8 drive to put the power in the water! It pulled a few boat companies through the economic bust of 2008 because people wanted new boats with QC4v’s.
I’m very proud of the growth of Mercury Racing and its team of outstanding contributors. I’m also proud that “this looser” is now one of the best earning businesses in the Brunswick portfolio. I retired in 2012 after 22 fantastic years at the helm. Mercury Racing is in good hands for continued exceptionalism. Though The Race Never Stops, you’re encouraged to go Wide Open. Happy 50th Mercury Racing (though it’s closer to 75th)!
Your loyal customer and biggest fan,
Fred Kiekhaefer
Following Fred Kiekhaefer's history is like following Rembrandt armed with an art pad and crayons, but here goes....
Like Fred I was born in 1947, so my memory and experiences parallel his time frame. My heroes were the very folks that Fred mentioned above, John Bakos, Odell Lewis, and of course Bill Sirois all of whom worked for Mercury and pioneered the racing "Team" concept. My first Mercury was a used 1951 Mercury "!0 Hurricane, which I raced for a few years in outlaw events. when I was 17, I teamed with a friend, and we obtained a 15' Powercat race hull with two Mercury 100 hp "1000's" and prepared it for the Hudson River Marathon in 1964. (While the photo says "winner" we actually came in 5th out of about 25 boats in class and 125 total entries.)
A year later I had found a job at a Mercury Glastron Dealership, K&K Outboard, and spent most of my earnings on a 16' Factory prepared Glastron with another set of Mercury 1000's and raced it and a succession of other hulls as often as possible.
I have dreamed, slept, and worshipped at the altar of boat racing for oh these many years since. My racing career brought me to most of the OPC venues in the US and Canada. One fateful event occurred at the Miami Marine Stadium and the 9 hour Orange Bowl Regatta held there in 1966, where I first met Fred's Dad, Carl, during a loud "disagreement" (I was 18 and very full of myself) ...which (to shut me up) culminated with him giving me a pair of Mercury 1100's (110 hp Outboards, not the monster motors of today) to replace a pair I had that had been damaged by a change made to them by Mercury personnel. I have bled "Mercury Black" ever since and my respect for both Kiekhaefers is immeasurable.
In later years I was privileged to race equipment on Mercury Team Canada on both sides of the border. I am not Canadian, but there was an overabundance of US drivers racing with Mercury assistance and I lived closest among the US candidates to Mercury's Canadian HQ in Mississauga, Ontario.
During the period when the above picture was taken, I was working with my closest friend and racing ally, George Linder, Mercury dealer Elbie Kronenberg, and my business partner Don Lostumbo, on developing the first production offshore catamarans, the Shadow Cat. This hull quickly gained worldwide notoriety and was beta tested in close collaboration with Mercury Racing at both Oshkosh (pictured) and Lake X. The boat won World and National Championships and set multiple records in all of the classes that it raced in.
After the success of the Shadow Cats, Don and I started Conquest Marine and with designs from George Linder, continued our development work with Mercury Racing;
Following the 1986 death of Mark Lavin in one of our hulls, George and I became founding members of the Mark Lavin Safety Foundation which continues to this day with worldwide impact.
I was also recruited by a video producer to fly in a helicopter with the door off doing live to tape narration at over 150 Offshore races. This led to both on site and studio work for major broadcast outlets including ESPN, Speed Channel, TNN, Prime and others. During this period I had the unique privilege of showcasing all of Mercury Racings product development to an eager television audience. I witnessed and broadcast both Outboard and Inboard racing product offerings including the open class fuel injected engines, the Mercury 1000SC, the #5 drive, the original K drive which subsequently became the #6, followed by the first dry sump modifications, the 2.4 and 2.5 Offshore racing outboards, the early CLE lowers, the Sportmasters, and the ever improving propeller modifications.
Currently I am Chairman of the American Powerboat Association's Offshore Racing Commission and get to watch from a choice seat as Mercury Racing moves smartly into the lead of 21st century marine performance technology.
There are too many other stories, names and memories to post here. Clearly, I have been blessed in my associations with both Mercury Marine and Mercury Racing and hope this highly condensed snapshot of my experiences is of interest to your readers.
Best wishes to Mercury Racing on this momentous anniversary.
Rich Luhrs
