There’s no holiday lull for John Tomlinson, Mike Thomas and the rest of the crew in this legendary rigging, service and powerboat storage outfit—and that’s just how they like it.
After earning a Superboat-class world championship in a 38-foot Skater catamaran with Performance Boat Center teammate Myrick Coil last month in Key West, Fla., John Tomlinson took a well-deserved break—at least for him. That’s right, the best throttleman in offshore racing history headed back to Miami to work three 12-hour days before jetting to Abu Dhabi to defend his 2015 Union Internationale Motonautique Class 1 world title. Sharing the cockpit of the Abu Dhabi MTI catamaran with Gary Ballough, Tomlinson returned to the states nine days later with a second-place overall finish.
“I don’t mind going over there but it’s much easier for four days at a time rather than what I just did with seven days in Key West, home in Miami for three days and then off to Abu Dhabi for nine days. Between racing and testing, we were in the water seven days in a row over there.
“I like going over there and competing,” he added. “But at the same time you know there are things that are going to slip through the cracks when you’re gone that long and you’re as busy as we are.”
and then