Eagle One skipper reveals why he agreed to sponsor Mackinac race (again)
Tim LaRiviere invests in sailors and sailing
Tim LaRiviere, the son of a mounted police officer in the City of Detroit, learned about sailboats while scrubbing them as a boy.
“We grew up modestly, to say the least,” he told me. “I’m the last of seven children. My mom worked in the library at Our Lady Queen of Peace school in Harper Woods, Mich., — where I went to school — and had a secondary job at the laundromat across the street. She showed up to mass every day of her life.”
LaRiviere, a prominent Grosse Pointe, Mich., resident, discovered sailing when one of his boat-cleaning customers at Crescent Sail Yacht Club in Grosse Pointe Farms, Mich., needed “flat bellies” to crew.
That changed LaRiviere’s life.
Now, his love of sailing and family memories have inspired him to sponsor the Bayview Yacht Club race from Port Huron to Mackinac Island — for the 100th race last year and the 101st race this year.
Unlike many sports sponsorships, LaRiviere doesn’t expect to sell a single product as a result of the investment. Sailors aren’t his customer base. Automakers pay his bills.
Because sometimes everything isn’t about the obvious return on investment.
“I’ve spent 40 years racing sailboats on Lake St. Clair, and to Mackinac Island, and I’m at a time in my life when I had the ability to support fellow sailors,” said LaRiviere, 71, of Grosse Pointe. “That’s what drives me to do it.”
Support from LaRiviere as a presenting sponsor in 2024 was essential to putting the milestone event together, said Matt Prost, general manager of Bayview Yacht Club in Detroit. “Without sponsors, we wouldn’t be able to do the race.”
While club officials declined to discuss details of annual race costs, sources told Shifting Gears that financial support exceeded $500,000 in the centennial race year, including entry fees. In 2025, Bayview made available presenting sponsorships for $225,000 with smaller sponsorships starting at $5,000.
“We try to run the event at break even,” said Paul Falcone, 2025 commodore of Bayview. “When additional funds become available, we implement upgrades to the race.”
What makes LaRiviere’s major contribution especially significant, organizers said, is that he provides financial support with no strings attached. It all goes to the race.
‘Exceptionally grateful’
Tim Prophit, 66, of St. Clair Shores, Mich., past commodore of Bayview and skipper of Fast Tango, a North American 40, told me, “As this year’s Mackinac Race chair and a member of the Mackinac Race Authority, we’re all exceptionally grateful for Tim’s support of our race this year and last.”
LaRiviere runs National Fleet Services based in Detroit. The company, which he founded in 1997, upfits Ford, Chevy, GMC and Ram vehicles — from chassis extensions to installing equipment — for delivery companies, moving truck rental companies, RV rental companies and residential HVAC and plumbing services companies.
The little boy who scrubbed boats is now a fixture on the sailboat scene: Past commodore of Bayview and a member of eight other clubs including the Detroit Yacht Club on Belle Isle in Detroit and The Old Club on Harsens Island in St. Clair County, Mich.
He owns 21 boats; of them, nine sailboats.
This year, LaRiviere will compete in his 37th Mackinac race on Eagle One, an Italia 14.98 just purchased from Italy and listed on the race scratch sheet as 50 feet long. The race from Port Huron to Mackinac that begins on Lake Huron just north of the Blue Water Bridge on Saturday, July 12, mark a debut for his new boat that will carry a skipper plus 10 crew members.
It is the world’s longest continuously run long distance freshwater race. The Cove Island course is 259 nautical miles (298 miles). The Shore course, which is the original 1925 course, is 204 nautical miles (235 miles).
A record 334 boats registered for the 100th race, as sailors came out of retirement and many flew across the country and the world to participate. So far this year, 195 boats are registered, Prophit confirmed on Wednesday, June 25.
Racers leave on Saturday — accompanied by cheering crowds and the sound of bagpipes played at the Port Huron Yacht Club. Boats sometimes struggle to make it on time to the awards party on Tuesday, depending on wind and weather.
Hallucinating from exhaustion
Getting involved as a race sponsor can happen sort of by accident.
LaRiviere ran into Paul Falcone, 68, of Grosse Pointe Woods, Mich., at a veterans event. The men, both U.S. Marines, recognized each other from Bayview and decided to do a double-handed Mackinac race together — an insane commitment by any measure.
Double-handed means two sailors only. To consider the amount of manual work that’s required to put up sails and take down sails and race non-stop through the night by moonlight, and sometimes storms, is chilling to non-sailors.
“We never had sailed together. But, because we are Marines, I knew he wouldn’t panic. I knew he would be steadfast. And he knew the same thing about me,” said Falcone, who served from 1975-78. In 1976, he was based in Okinawa, Japan, and served on a ship that traveled to Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan and The Philippines.
So, in 2011, LaRiviere and Falcone took a 46-foot boat onto the racecourse and finished last in their class.
“By the time you pull the #1 sail up through the hatch of a 46-foot boat, you don’t have any muscle left. You’re done. Your arms are rubber,” Falcone said.
Thumbs were bleeding after attaching dozens of spring-loaded D-rings that attach the sails to the wire that goes from the bow of the boat to the top of the mast.
“You hoist the sail up in the air … then a storm comes in and you have to take the damn thing down that you put up 20 minutes ago,” Falcone said. “The boat was heeling over, the rail was in the water. We should have been excited and yet we could barely stay awake. I thought, ‘Oh my God, a deer just ran in front of the boat.’”
They were hallucinating from exhaustion.
‘… wasn’t punishment enough’
Then again two years ago, they raced again but on a 33.15-foot Tartan 10.
“The first (race) wasn’t punishment enough,” LaRiviere said. “We did it again and did pretty well but realized we didn’t want to do it a third time.”
Long distance competitive sailing is like a woman having a baby, sailors often say. Give her enough time and she forgets all the pain.
After racing together from Port Huron in 2023, the two Marines drove to Chicago to compete in the Chicago to Mackinac Race and Falcone introduced the idea of sponsorship as incoming chair of the Mackinac sponsorship committee.
“He asked, ‘What do I get for it?’ And I told him, ‘For the business you’re in, not a whole hell of a lot,’” Falcone said. “But by the time we got to Chicago, I had a draft sponsorship agreement in his lawyer’s hands for review. Our sponsorship problems were solved.”
LaRiviere is known for his generosity — monetary support, time, anything that’s requested of him, said Lynn Kotwicki, 53, of Royal Oak, who races on Hot Ticket, a J/120.
When she served as Bayview’s first female commodore in 2022, she consulted with LaRiviere on military protocol. He is known to wear his dress military uniform to formal events, sailors told me.
‘More than just a race’
Pamela Wall, 71, of Port Huron, is 2025 commodore of the Port Huron Yacht Club and a veteran of 29 races to Mackinac Island on Chippewa, her Tartan 34C. She said the event gets more expensive every year for Bayview and finding sponsors is a struggle.
“The Mackinac Race is more than just a race, it’s an annual reunion with friends you see and race against from all over,” she said. “All of us who have participated multiple times have such great memories of the challenges and, more so, the time spent with our crews on the boat and the celebrations on the island. It’s a special time, and I understand and appreciate Mr. LaRiviere’s support of this great tradition.”
As harbormaster at the Port Huron Yacht Club, Wall confirmed that Eagle One is among the boats scheduled to dock at the club marina between the Black River and St. Clair River prior to the July race.
(Note: Pamela Wall is my stepmom.)
Creating memories, freshwater and salt
LaRiviere, who also has homes in Clearwater Beach, Fla., and Port Orange, Fla., noted that he has won the Lipton Club Regatta the past five years at the Smyrna Yacht Club in New Smyrna Beach, Fla. In 2024, he raced his Tartan 10.
All his boats are named Eagle One.
While family members may not race with LaRiviere, they have appeared in photos at starting lines and finish lines.
Beth (Van Antwerp) LaRiviere, the daughter of a courtroom bailiff, shared 39 years and two children with Tim LaRiviere. She died at age 64 on Christmas morning 2019. A service followed at St. Clare of Montefalco Parish in Grosse Pointe Park.
“She was a wonderful wife and an even better mother,” Tim LaRiviere said. “We raced to the island. And Mackinac was one of her favorite places. It’s fun to keep that experience going for others. I wanted to give back …”
Editor’s Note: Phoebe Wall Howard is a member of the Port Huron Yacht Club. Her husband is a past commodore.
This article part of an annual summer series on sailboat racing. Find all sailor stories here.
Sailor beats death under moonless sky
Fast Tango: ‘Dead f**king last' to victory after big mistake in 100th Mackinac race
Mackinac Fire Chief throws pickle party after epic loss
Note: I’m a proud member of the Iowa Writers’ Collaborative. This week, I recommend an essay by Nicole Baart titled “You are not replaceable” about an elevator encounter and AI.
Always enjoy reading sailor and sailing stories from the Great Lakes. Mr Falcone's comment while beat tired about the deer in front of the boat... was poetic and authentic.
Thanks again, Ms Howard.
Gregg
Always a great pleasure to read your latest podcasts! Enjoy your adventures this season ❣️