Commentary: Dealing With It

In any project meant to commemorate a milestone for an event and capture its history, something or someone will get left out. And so it is was with 100-page program we produced—you may not have known this because we intentionally kept the speedonthewater.com name and logo off the cover—for the 20th annual Boyne Thunder Poker Run.

The owner of a 46-foot Skater Powerboats catamaran dubbed Deal With It, longtime Boyne Thunder Poker Run participant Steve Gordon makes sure volunteers are fed during the event. Photos by Pete Boden copyright Shoot 2 Thrill Pix

Neither Steve Gordon, who has participated in and supported the Northern Michigan event for 19 of its 20 years, nor Ron Szolack, whose participation and support numbers are much like Gordon’s, were included. A pair of Michiganders, Gordon and Szolack are true devotees of the event. For two days, Gordon even provides breakfast, lunch and dinner for volunteers and marina employees in the park at the docks.

How did such glaring omissions happen, especially given that we’ve covered Boyne Thunder religiously for the past 10 years and did a ton of research for the program? There are no excuses—we simply missed two key figures in the event.

Ron Szolack has debuted several new boats at the Boyne Thunder Poker Run, including the new Cigarette Racing Team 42 Auroris he ran this year.

We did tons of research through telephone interviews. We pored through our own stories on the event and looked at thousands of images.

And we still omitted—though unintentionally to say the least—Gordon and Szolack.

All apologies, gentlemen.

We remain proud of the commemorative program and what it accomplished. It enabled us to pay for the live band on Saturday night, which cut a significant cost out of 2023 Boyne Thunder bottom-line expenses. That, in turn, benefits the Challenge Mountain and Camp Quality-Michigan programs for children supported by the event.

But the program would have been even better with Gordon and Szolack in it.

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