Mike Straub, a very determined software developer from Omaha, Nebraska, just completed the Great Loop on his 12-foot Sea-Doo.
Straub started on June 9 from Bellevue, just south of Omaha on the Missouri River, and put more than 6,000 miles under his hull until he crossed his wake on the Missouri earlier this week. Straub wrote on his Facebook page, Sea Doo Looper, that he’s now going up the Missouri and plans to arrive back in Omaha on Saturday.
For Straub, the Loop was hardly a whim. He believes in living his passion. A few years ago, he drove across the United States with his teenage son, who has autism, in a Corvette. He named his Sea-Doo Y WAIT – the same words that appear on the license plate of his Tesla.
Straub bought his Sea-Doo FishPro Trophy new last spring. It’s 12′ 2″ long with a beam of 4′ 1.” It weighs 898 pounds dry and carries 18.5 gallons of gas for its 170-hp Rotax engine. Top speed: Almost 60 mph. Straub customized it for the Loop, building a rack to hold four six-gallon gas cans and room aft for his camping supplies (a tent, sleeping bag, air mattress and stove) since he did not have any land support.
There’s a MFD display on a handlebar with GPS. He put a handheld VHF in one pocket of his life jacket with a separate mic threaded near his face so he could use the radio while still keeping both hands on the handlebar. Another pocket held an ACR PLB for safety and a Garmin inReach Mini that transmitted his location every ten minutes and that he could use to send text messages home to his family. He set up a dry bag he could reach with one hand for snacks and Gatorade.
Straub usually ran from six to ten hours a day. As he posted more videos on You Tube (Micheal Straub – Sea Doo Looper), Straub became something of a folk hero on the Looper circuit. People invited him in to their homes for the night, or arranged to drive him to gas stations and hotels. Last week, on the electrified section of the Illinois River, he was not permitted to drive his Sea-Doo, so another Looper with a cruising boat invited him on board and towed the Sea-Doo behind.
One of Straub’s longest offshore stretches was about 110 miles from Naples to Key West. He wrote that he wasn’t bored; dolphins swam alongside to keep him company.
And Straub took some time off along the way. His wife and two sons visited him for a week in Key West to celebrate his 50th birthday and 25th wedding anniversary. His two brothers visited him on the Outer Banks in North Carolina.
Some days were calm; others were not. And if you have any misconceptions that riding a Sea-Doo 6,000 miles is easy, click on the link below; it shows Straub crossing Lake Michigan at 35-40 mph.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dgln2fAeDLc
