Re: Old Race Tracks
Posted: Tue Mar 19, 2019 1:09 pm
Yes, I thought you might be a South Islander who's found another part of the world to make home...
The Lotus 19 was crashed by the mechanic, Bruce Richardson, at Warwick Farm.
When you mention Benalla, I think you might be referring to Winton, which is near Benalla. It's a little circuit in a paddock which is actually a Common. The circuit I would refer to as Benalla was used just once and I don't think the meeting made it as far as actual racing before police intervened and stopped it all. That was about 1938.
I do like 'investigating' old circuits. As far as I know, and I've tried to find out, I am the only person who's seen every circuit on which the Australian Grand Prix has been held. And because I started driving around them and looking at them so long ago, many I've seen are simply no longer there.
When I did my jaunt around Europe almost three years ago I visited a number of old circuits, so I'll keep posting pics here and see who can pick them. US circuits weren't so numerous, but there were a few apart from Savannah.
And to Ken, the Vanderbilt Cup races were important at Savannah, but the US Grand Prize was held there as well. That would be the title to the races I'd put at the top of the list. There were others, too, I found in googling around. And I also found pictures of convicts working on the roads in preparation for the races, and that some new road-building methods were perfected in the course of their experimentation with making those roads better.
Reading this...
http://porschecarshistory.com/wp-content/old/biblio3/26/FirstUS_GP.pdf
...will fascinate anyone on this forum, I'd reckon. And some pictures are pretty good too.
The one thing lacking about the Savannah circuits (I think there were three versions) is decent published maps. They are just hopeless!
The Lotus 19 was crashed by the mechanic, Bruce Richardson, at Warwick Farm.
When you mention Benalla, I think you might be referring to Winton, which is near Benalla. It's a little circuit in a paddock which is actually a Common. The circuit I would refer to as Benalla was used just once and I don't think the meeting made it as far as actual racing before police intervened and stopped it all. That was about 1938.
I do like 'investigating' old circuits. As far as I know, and I've tried to find out, I am the only person who's seen every circuit on which the Australian Grand Prix has been held. And because I started driving around them and looking at them so long ago, many I've seen are simply no longer there.
When I did my jaunt around Europe almost three years ago I visited a number of old circuits, so I'll keep posting pics here and see who can pick them. US circuits weren't so numerous, but there were a few apart from Savannah.
And to Ken, the Vanderbilt Cup races were important at Savannah, but the US Grand Prize was held there as well. That would be the title to the races I'd put at the top of the list. There were others, too, I found in googling around. And I also found pictures of convicts working on the roads in preparation for the races, and that some new road-building methods were perfected in the course of their experimentation with making those roads better.
Reading this...
http://porschecarshistory.com/wp-content/old/biblio3/26/FirstUS_GP.pdf
...will fascinate anyone on this forum, I'd reckon. And some pictures are pretty good too.
The one thing lacking about the Savannah circuits (I think there were three versions) is decent published maps. They are just hopeless!
