show me your flat trackers and desert racers

1. I'd caption it "Trackmaster Atlas," but honesty compels me to add that it could just as easily be a Commando (and that, if that were the case, if one was to look at its other side, the Norton logo on the timing cover might be diagonally, not horizontally, oriented) or any other Norton twin from 500cc to 830cc. I am now going to shut up about this Norton.

2. A pretty ordinary -- in fact, a kind of sloppy-looking* -- Bonnie-based flat tracker; but it definitely is a flat tracker, so that's something.

3. Gary Nixon was getting a lift to the races in a buddy's trailer, sitting around with the buddy and half of his pit crew. I don't know how they were passing the time but one can guess: #9's hobbies and opinions were well known (and much disliked by the clean-living, pro-Vietnam War guys who governed AMA-sanctioned racing). After a couple of hours, Nixon decided a walk might clear his head some. He had his upper body and one leg out the side door, hovering over the absent steps above Highway 101, when a mechanic got hold of his shirt collar and brought the outside part of him back inside. The truck and trailer were going between 65 and 75 mph. I'm glad Nixon remained in this world as long as he did.

* The kind I'd be happy with, in other words.

Splinters were an occupational hazard for these fellows.




Both motorcycles and automobiles raced on the Miami track, called 'Fulford by the Sea,' bankrolled by Cark Fisher, who was the largest Miami developer at the time. Below, a shot giving a sense of scale of the extreme banking on the one and a quarter-mile track. Famed motorcycle racer Ralph Hepburn in one of his first car races, turned a qualifying lap of 141.9mph, in 1926, and that wasn't good-enough for first! For comparison, it wasn't until 1956 (!) that an Indy 500 contestant was able to break that (Jack McGrath, Kurtis-Craft K500C 143.79mph)



The Miami FL board track, the fastest such track, with its 50-degree (!) turns, and also a very-unlucky one. It was built in 1925 and was totally-destroyed in the September 1926 Miami FL hurricane, which killed hundreds of people. The track was not rebuilt, however, the lumber salvaged from it was used to rebuild the city of Miami, and a handful of those buildings are still standing today.

I demo'ed a Miami-area house listed in the ownership abstract and city records as being built in 1926, and I salvaged a few pieces of lumber, one I use for a drill press back-up board to avoid the 'arc of shame,' it's Dade County pine, which is very hard and resinous. I have no-way of knowing if this was a piece of lumber salvaged from the Miami board track after the September 1926 hurricane, but if you run your hand with the grain, you can feel deposits of tire rubber, and a faint whiff of motor oil and gasoline... .

More great board track racer pictures here, tracks, racers, and machines: