Anyone heard of Winner boats?

Last fall I picked up a '89 Winner 17' Intrigue I/O for far less than NADA. It has the 3.0 Mercrusier and Alpha 1. I have found very little if any information about this boat but it does ride well and throws a pretty decent wake without any ballast being added yet.

I figured this would be a good boat to learns some skills on and find out if I eventually want to move up to a wake specific boat. I'm not crazy about the cheesy graphics but I do like the layout and I've polished the gelcoat up and it looks a ton better now.

Has anyone heard of them or do you know anything about them?

http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a387/UNCCGrad/winner1.jpg

http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a387/UNCCGrad/winner2.jpg

No but that one looks to be in good condition for an 89. At that age, brand name doesn't mean nearly as much as condition of the boat and especially motor/outdrive.

One thing I have found out is that they use an all fiberglass construction....no wood stringers to rot. I guess this is why it has such a soft ride. It really is in good condition (minus some beat up handrails) and I think I got a good buy on it. I plan on keeping it for a couple seasons until I decide to trade up.

I'm a little concerned that the 3.0 won;t be enough if I ever decide to load it down with people and sacs but I knew the boat was a compromise to begin with.

(Message edited by uncc_grad on April 03, 2007)

the 3.0 can be pretty underpowered, for sure. You won't be able to load it down all that much, but riding is riding.

Stay off this site unless you want to upgrade sooner! Seriously!

looks like a winner to me

It ain't the best, but it's paid for. She'll do until I decide to upgrade. You guys are going to laugh your arses off, but take a look at what I learned on last summer! I do a lot of hunting and fishing out of it, but it sure sucked for wakeboarding.

http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a387/UNCCGrad/Hunting/tunnel008.jpg

I'm no small guy either at 6'1" and 200#

(Message edited by uncc_grad on April 03, 2007)

A friend of mine had Wienner with a 150 Evinrude on the back. He got it used from a local marina. It was a former rental. They put new seats in it, but they never screwed them to the floor. The thing was WAY overproped. With six of us in the boat, we would all have to lean out over the front to get it on plane. Once on plane it would get up in the neighborhood of 70mph (no joke). We would get that thing trimmed out and flying over the afternoon Tahoe chop and get to the bars in a big fat hurry. Any time you cranked the wheel, those new back to back seats would tip over, beers would go flying and somebody was on the floor. I managed to get up on ski behind it once. Longest 2 minutes of my life.

My advise would be to prop that thing down in order to get some pull out of that little Merc. The wake has got to better than that skiff.