50 MTIs Trek to Marathon Key for Another Spectacular Fun Run
Marine Technology Inc. welcomed 50 boats and 300 people for this year’s MTI Owners Fun Run last weekend, which took the fleet from North Miami Beach to the Florida Keys for a three-day run from Thursday to Saturday. The journey encompassed 650 miles, with company President Randy Scism leading the group in the 48′ pace boat.
“We had a great run,” says MTI sales and marketing chief Tim Gallagher. “All of us made it back [to Haulover Marine Center] except for David Spear. On our way back up, we stopped at Playa Largo for lunch. He started walking around the place and said, ‘You know what? This place is nice! I’m going to stay for a couple more days.’ So he’s actually running back up right now.”
On the way down to Marathon Key, the group stopped for a buffet lunch at Gilbert’s Resort in Key Largo. “That’s pretty much the only place you can tie 50 boats up on your way down to Faro Blanco [Resort & Yacht Club] on Marathon Key,” Gallagher says. This was the fourth time that Faro Blanco has hosted MTI during their Fun Run. “We had a luggage truck carrier bring everybody’s luggage down, so that worked out very well for everyone,” he adds.
Gallagher drove the silver 340X powered by twin Mercury racing 400R outboards displayed at the Miami show. “I had some new clients with me who were getting their order finalized, so they got their seat time in the boat for the weekend, which was great.”
During the event, the MTIs made a couple of runs to Key West, staged a raft-up and visited the Bass Pro Shops at Islamorada. “With 50 boats, you have to spread them out a little bit—you can’t go everywhere together,” Gallagher explains. “There are too many boats. So Randy took some in one direction, and I took some of the others. But everybody had a great time. We had a nice finale party on Saturday at Faro Blanco with a buffet dinner and had our tech crew put up a video presentation featuring some of our antics from the weekend.”
Participants traveled from as far away as the West Coast and the Northeast. “One of our customers came from Maine, which was really cool,” said MTI’s Taylor Scism. “People came in from all over—it was our biggest showing ever, which is awesome. It was my first time attending and being involved in the planning of the Fun Run. Tim did an excellent job planning it, and I helped with some details getting everything together.”
The next MTI Fun Run takes place in Chicago on June 27-29, a collaboration between MTI and Westrec Marinas. It’s MTI’s first such event in the Chicago area.
Look for complete coverage of the MTI Owners Fun Run in the May 2019 issue of Speedboat Magazine.
