In The Lead Video Series Flashback: John Cosker Of Mystic Powerboats

John Cosker, the owner and founder of Mystic Powerboats in DeLand, Fla., is never the loudest guy in the room. He’s soft-spoken and understated by nature. He doesn’t like a lot of attention, much less require it.

From building offshore racing catamarans to creating a thriving line of luxury performance center consoles, John Cosker of Mystic Powerboats has enjoyed a brilliant career—and it’s still going strong. Click the image above to watch the video.

But he’s always one of the smartest guys in the room, and for more than 25 years he’s been proving it. A college-trained naval architect with a heady resume that includes working with the famed Tom Gentry on the Gentry Eagle project, Cosker was inspired to start Mystic after a visit with another maverick boat-builder, Peter Hledin of Skater Powerboats fame.

Though Cosker’s 50-foot catamaran made him a household name in the go-fasting world, it did not make him rich. In fact, when the recession of 2008 hit Cosker and his wife, Robin, found themselves as two of Mystic’s very few employees. They kept the company alive, while realizing that offering one model—a big-dollar offshore racing catamaran—wasn’t the key to financial security.

WATCH IN THE LEAD WITH JOHN COSKER OF MYSTIC POWERBOATS

That came in 2015 when Mystic reinvented itself as a luxury performance center console builder—and the company’s trajectory has been straight up ever since. Cosker has expanded and re-expanded his DeLand facility to keep, only to expand it again just last year.

And along the way, he became the Lake of the Ozarks Shootout’s main 200-mph man in American Ethanol, a 50-foot Mystic cat of his own creation.

John Cosker is, without question, a true American success story. Just watch.