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After two back-to-back titles for Dave Heerensperger's Winged Wonder Pay 'N Pak, one with Mickey Remund in 1973 and the other with George Henley in 1974, the Pak was looking to three-peat in 1975, but after Smilin’ George decided to retire, the seat was left open. Former Pak driver Mickey Remund already had a seat with the Miss Budweiser team, so Heerensperger had to go fishing for a new driver. He decided to go with veteran driver Jim McCormick who took the reins at the 1975 season opener in Miami. Unfortunately, the Pak underperformed and was not even able to make the final heat by scoring only 394 points. The following race at the Presidents Cup was also not good as McCormick finished in dead last during the first heat of the day.
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| Photo by John Woodward |
The two sub-par performances by the veteran McCormick did not sit well with Heerensperger so he coaxed Henley out of retirement who then went out and had one of his worst career races scoring zero points in the Pak at the Kentucky Governor’s Cup in Owensboro with a DNS and a DNF. Meanwhile, Billy Schumacher in the U-74 Weisfield’s was making plenty of waves by winning two of the first three races of the 1975 season. Well, you can only imagine that there was a team gathering after the Owensboro race on how to turn the season around. Henley righted the ship and picked up a 3rd place podium finish in Detroit and then proceeded to go on a rampage by winning the next 4 races and putting the Pak right back in the national title race.
Two other hulls had also found the winner’s circle; the Budweiser won on the Potomac River and would win again in Phoenix, and Tom D’Eath in the U-2 Miss U.S. picked up a big win on her home turf in Detroit. Other noteworthy hulls were the U-55 Lincoln Thrift with Milner Irvin, and the U-6 Miss Madison/Hamm’s Bear driven by Jerry Bangs for their consistency in making nearly every final heat of the season. Everyone’s nemesis seemed to be Bill Muncey in the U-71 Atlas Van Lines (7), the Staudacher built lemon that kept Muncey off the top step of the podium for the third consecutive year. Controversy swirled around Muncey’s interpretation of the rule book as he kept searching for a race win that continued to elude the Atlas camp.
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| Photo by John Woodward |
As the fleet headed into the last race of the 1975 season in sunny San Diego, the Weisfeld’s held a slight 249-point lead over the Pak. Schumacher had already wrapped up the driver’s title and was looking to add another national title to his already impressive resume. After the first heat, the lead had dwindled to 149 points after Henley narrowly defeated Schumacher to take the crucial 400 points away from the Weisfield’s. Then the wheels fell off as the Weisfield’s suffered engine failure and was unable to finish the second heat thus taking Schumacher out of the final and out of the national title race.
The Pak took the Lincoln Thrift to the finish line in heat 2B to barely squeak out the win by inches, and then in the final heat, the Pak had another amazing deck to deck battle, this time with Remund in the Budweiser. However, Henley in the Pak found a way to outduel the Budweiser to the finish line and win by a mere few seconds. The final two heats of the 1975 season at the San Diego Weisfield’s Trophy race gave the U-1 Pay n Pak enough points to leapfrog the U-74 Weisfield’s and claim their 3rd consecutive National Championship. Winning the driver’s title for Billy was nice but I’m sure that losing the team title had to sting a little. George Henley decided to hang it up for good after the season was over while Schumacher stayed on for one more year to drive the U-74 Olympia Beer.
The mighty Winged Wonder’s dominance rolled over to a 4th year as Bill Muncey would purchase the hull when Heerensperger decided to step away from the sport. This famous and innovative hydroplane designed and built by the master Ron Jones went on to win the 1976 title as the U-76 Atlas Van Lines and became the first hull in hydroplane history to win 4 straight titles on its way to 22 total career victories.