Los Angeles herald., 1909-06-27
RACE TALK ON
EVERY TONGUE
AUTO DEALERS AND FANS ON
RAW EDGE
SANTA MONICA RACERS BEGIN
TO ARRIVE
Practice Work Commences Next Sat-
urday, at Which Time All Details
viii BE Nearly Finished at
All Points

With the two great dealers races,
for light and heavy cars, at Santa
Monica but two weeks away automobile
fans are on the raw edge of excitement,
while the contesting dealers are having
more or less difficulty in Disgusting
their natural nervousness over the
outcome. All along gasoline row moth
ing else is talked, and the gossip and
rumors that one may encounter in a
days walk would fill a newspaper to
overfiowing with interesting sidelights.
Some of these sidelights emanate from
profound sources and are worth their
full measure of credence, while others
are natural vaporings which reflect the
telltale animosities which pass from
rival camp to rival camp.
Cars Are Arriving
Cars are beginning to arrive, and
before the week is ended it is believed
that practically all the racing cars
will be on the ground, and probably
on the course taking their daily try
outs and tuning up for the momentous
occasion when they will be called upon
to carry the colors of their factories
and their representatives across the
finish line amid the plaudits of the
cheering thousands of non-partisans,
gho will cheer just as loud whichever
the winning car happens to be.
Santa Monica Is Faithful
The good people of Santa Monica
are doing Spartan work in carrying
out their agreement with the dealers
to put the lightning-fast track into
perfect racing condition, and by the
end of the week it Is expected that this
work will be entirely finished.
One of the wise decisions of the
past week was the rounding of the
Hf,n Csarx oil t1aot tffaffa
so as to change the contour of the
gutter line to a graceful curve, which
will require but the slightest slackening
of speed for the racers to take in their
mad flight.
The only bad turn that will be found
in the course will be at the corner Of
Ocean avenue and Nevada avenue,
which is a sharp right angle. This
turn is now being banked high by the
use of lumber and dirt and, when COM
pleted, should permit of being taken at
fully thirty or thirty-five miles an
hour.
Speculation Is Rife
Speculation is rife as to what aver
age speed will be necessary to be main
tained on the part of the winning cars
and also as to the probable winners
While some have been so rash as to
predict and even to wager that the
winning car will average a mile a
minute or better, this opinion is not
generally held and the more sober
Judgment of conservative racing men
favors an average somewhere between
fifty and fifty-flve miles an hour. This
opinion is somewhat strengthened
since the Cobe and Indiana trophy
races at Crown Point, where the aver
age speed of the winner of the light
and heavy car races, respectively, was
forty-nine and fifty-one miles. The
cars entered in those races were really
more powerful cars, specially built for
the race, and what they could not do
Is not expected to be done at Santa
Monica
To maintain an average of even fifty
miles an hour the racers will have to
exceed sixty miles on the straight
aways, or at least equal it, and this
pace over a course 200 miles long will
be sufficient tax on every car entered
Ninety Miles Possible
There are portions of the course, es-
pecially on Nevada avenue, where
some of the cars for a short distance
may be able to attain a speed of even
eighty and ninety miles, a number of
the entrants being capable of this phe-
nomenal speed, but this same speed
must go into the bag and be shaken
up with the lower speeds on less prom
ising portions of the course and an
average thus be struck.
An army of workmen is busy around
the entire course, leVeling up the rough
spots, filing and oiling, while still
other workmen are pushing the grand
stands and paddocks to completion 1t
is expected that fully 25,000 will wit
ness the races at the start and finish
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