MOTOR RACING / SHAV GLICK : Dalva Speeds to Offshore Pinnacle

When Anna Dalva was 11 or 12, she would take her father’s Boston Whaler to the lake behind the family home in the Catskill Mountains and race around, fighting her three brothers for seat time.

One day, she was looking at one of her father’s boating magazines and spotted a picture of Betty Cook on the cover. Cook, a 50-something grandmother from Southern California, had just won one of her two world offshore racing championships.

“I told everyone I wanted to be just like Betty Cook,” Dalva said. “That was 20 years or so ago, and I’m still telling them the same thing. I want to win everything she won and break all the records she set.

“She has been my role model, my idol, all those things. I’m just sorry that I never met her, although I did go to her funeral.”

Cook, the world’s premier female boat racer, died several years ago of cancer at the age of 70.

Dalva now lives in Pacific Palisades with her husband, former racer Morris, and three children, Shayne 19, Candice 9, and Zachary 5. She spends much of her time in Florida, however, because that is where Super Boat Racing, Inc., holds its races.

She keeps her boat, the Cigarette Lady II, a 6,000-pound, 42-foot Open Vee, in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. This year’s opener is scheduled for May 20 off Key West, Fla., which is also the annual site of the world championships in November.

She used to race with her husband, but no more.

“Morris liked to go about 70 m.p.h., but after that he gets nervous,” she said. “I like to go about 100.

“After 80, it’s a whole different ballgame on the ocean. It’s more dangerous, more difficult to concentrate because you have to stay so focused on the waves that it’s hard to listen or talk with the throttleman or the navigator. It’s flat scary looking for water skiers, sailboats or jet skiers that wander out near the course. When you’re up around 100, they look like little ants.”

Riding on either side of the 5-foot-5, 115-pound Dalva during races are throttleman Steve Carr of Hawaii and navigator Mike Cassar of San Diego.

“Jeff Cox doesn’t ride in the boat, but he’s just as important,” Dalva said. “He’s the engineer, and last year his engines never broke once. We won several races because we were still running at the end after faster boats dropped out.”

Dalva broke the late Bob Nordskog’s Open Vee speed record with a timed 110 m.p.h. four years ago on Lake Mead.

“It was a thrill for me to get one of Bob’s records, because no one helped me more in getting started racing,” she said. “I ran with his Pacific Offshore Power Boat Racing Assn. on the West Coast, and he taught me the importance of safety.

“He always used to say, ‘If you pass me, you’re going too fast.’ One day I passed him, and I don’t think he liked it, but he was a wonderful, wonderful man who did more for offshore racing on the West Coast than anyone.”

Dalva is addicted to speed on shore too. Her favorite training exercise is in-line skating along the beach at Venice.

*

Motor Racing Notes

SPEEDWAY BIKES--The Cirello 25-Lap Classic, longest speedway motorcycle race of the year, is scheduled for Friday night at the Orange County Fairgrounds in Costa Mesa. Gary Hicks is defending champion in the fifth running of the handicap enduro. Also on the program will be a 12-lap race for support riders. . . . For the first time, North American qualifying for the world championship will be held outside Southern California. The qualifier is Saturday at Auburn, Calif. The first four will continue to the second round on June 11 in Coventry, England.

MIDGETS--Saugus Speedway will hold its once-a-year U.S. Auto Club midget and three-quarter midget program Saturday night. Mini-stocks and a train race will complete the show.

STOCK CARS--Street stocks and IMCA modifieds will be featured Friday night in Figure 8 racing at Ventura Raceway. . . . Kern County Raceway will have dwarf cars, late models and spectator drags Saturday night.

SPRINT CARS--The Sprint Car Racing Assn. will try again to race at Santa Maria Speedway on Saturday night. The first effort on April 29 was rained out. . . . IMCA sprint cars and Western Legends dwarf cars will race Saturday night at Ventura Raceway.

RALLY--Defending SCCA/Michelin PRO Rally champions Paul Choiniere and Jeff Becker of Shelburne, Vt., won the 12th Rim of the World rally last weekend in the Angeles National Forest by 11 seconds over the Jamaican team of Peter Moodie and Michael Fennell. Choiniere drove a Hyundai Electra, Moodie a Mazda 323GTR in the 115-mile event. Lon Peterson and Bill Gutzmann of Victorville won the production class in a Korean-built Kia Sephia. It was Kia’s North American debut.