VERO BEACH — Mike Sadlon, a structural maintenance technician with South Florida Water Management, and Dr. Rob Callery, a partner with Ocean Oaks Dental Group, are hooked on speed – in a safe way. Their quest for velocity will propel the pair this weekend to Pennsylvania, where they will race in the P1 Superstock Series at the Pittsburgh Three Rivers Regatta, the largest inland regatta in the United States.
“I grew up on boats,” said Sadlon, who has been racing for decades. “My grandparents had a cottage on the water in Indiana and we spent most of our summers either on the Jersey Shore or on a lake in Indiana. We’ve always had boats; whether my grandparents, my parents or mine.”
Mike and Paula Sadlon moved to Vero Beach six years ago, where even his job allows him to spend time on the water.
“Pretty clever of me huh?” he asks with a grin. Sadlon began his racing pursuit in the 1980s. Employed in the boating industry, he had a customer with a 12-foot, one-person tunnel race boat. “It kind of flies,” said Sadlon. “I’d drive it for some of his testing, and would help him do the repairs and the upkeep.”
He eventually became crew chief for a 33-foot cigarette style off-shore boat; testing and taking care of the boat NASCAR-style.
“When we tested, I did all the throttling,” said Sadlon. Racing teams consist of a driver to steer the boat and a throttle man to control the speed and trim.
Before a Key West championship, he came back in to see the boat owner shaking his head before telling Mike, “If you were throttling this boat we’d be winning all the races.”
“At that moment I made it my mission to get my own boat.”
It’s a little different for Rob Callery, who is getting his feet wet for the first time after years of racing Corvettes.
Callery will be throttle man to Sadlon as driver.
In the past, Callery raced in the SCCA Solo, which he calls “a fancy name for autocross,” and now competes in high performance driving events.
Both self-proclaimed craft beer geeks, Sadlon and Callery were introduced through Vero’s renowned “Beer Ambassador” Kristyn Lier.
“There are seven of us who get together every other month to share different craft beers and food,” said Callery. “The last BGs (short for beer geeks or beer gathers) was at my house, and before we even started drinking Mike said, ‘Do you want to be in the race boat with me?’ I asked where, and when he said Pittsburgh, I said, ‘Absolutely! It’s my home town.’ I didn’t realize it was the big Three Rivers Regatta; it’s a huge event in Pittsburgh. It goes from Friday to July 4th. It is absolutely nuts.”
His wife, Cathie, also from Pittsburgh, will join him for the weekend, which includes a concert featuring Vero’s favorite country music star Jake Owen.
Given only a couple of weeks to prepare, they quickly went out to put practice hours on the boat they have named “Miss Vero Beach.”
“He has to be comfortable with the boat and we have to be comfortable with each other,” said Sadlon, noting that crews must sync their performance for optimum speed. “It’s kind of a unique motor sport.”
“The odd part about this is you get no feedback from each other physically,” adds Callery. “If you’re driving a car and you’re feeling the car doing something odd with the steering wheel, your foot is going to compensate. With this I’m feeling the boat but I’m not getting any input from the steering wheel.”
Between eight and 10 identical 28- foot boats, called a Panther 28SS, will compete side-by-side at speeds of about 70 mph. No modifications are allowed to the motor, a 250 horsepower Evinrude E-TEC outboard.
“Typically, boat racing is all about the money. The idea of this series is to take the money out of the sport; to make it more about the driver and the throttle man and their skills,” said Sadlon.
The races are recorded by helicopter for the Speed 2 channel, but are not shown live as there is a lot of editing involved with a full day of races.
The best way to follow Rob and Mike’s big adventure is through the website, www.P1SuperstockUSA.com.// After the Pittsburgh Regatta, they will compete in Detroit a few weeks later and then Morehead City, N.C. for the finale.