Inside SOTW Mag: The Reese Langheim Interview

By the time you read this, there’s a more-than-good chance Reese Langheim, who owns Langheim Concrete Service Inc, in Springfield, Ill., and his wife, Sara Elizabeth, will have a floating bar at their waterfront home on the shores of Springfield Lake. “Sara called me the other day while I was at work and said, ‘Hey honey, I bought a boat,’” said Langheim, who competes in outboard racing’s Super Stock class in a 32-foot Victory Team catamaran. “It’s a 26-footer she’s converting into a bar. It has a 40-hp outboard engine and will run a blistering 11 mph.” The pontoon-scow addition makes the Langheims a three-boat family. In addition to the Dubai-built Victory raceboat, they have a 32-foot canopied Blade catamaran from Australia that Langheim used for his first two years in the sport. (He ran the then-new Victory cat for most of last season.)

Pictured with Brad Wade (left) and Ricky Maldonado (center), Reese Langheim was excited to introduce the Jackhammer Offshore Racing team’s new 32-foot Victory raceboat last season. Photo by Pete Bodeb/Shoot 2 Thrill Pix

But while the pontoon-bar might be a pleasant diversion, all Langheim—a 41-year-old concrete contractor, commercial real estate investor and rental property owner—really wants to do is get back on the racecourse.

Your 2019 season ended abruptly on the second day of racing at the Race World Offshore event in Key West, Fla., when you and your throttle man, Ricky Maldonado, blew over. That must has been interesting.

We were going along really good and “turned it up a little bit.” We were passing some people, and just as we were going by the Outer Mole, running as fast as the boat would go, we blew over. It felt like nothing, really, until we hit the water. You don’t even recognize how hard you hit when you come down—until you get up the next day and find out how sore you are. After I got it sorted out, I was able to exit on my own. I could see the divers through the windshield in the water before I got out the boat. They were right there. They did an awesome job.

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