From the Rolls-Royce experimental archive: a quarter of a million communications from Rolls-Royce, 1906 to 1960's. Documents from the Sir Henry Royce Memorial Foundation (SHRMF).
Article from 'The Autocar' magazine discussing issues with motor racing and suggestions for its improvement.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 160\5\ scan0094 | |
| Date | 27th December 1940 | |
| 654 The Autocar, December 27th, 1940 DONINGTON. England's finest road-racing course, where really high speeds are possible and the public is able to obtain a good view. What is Wrong With More Excitement, Lower Cost and Better Accommod By EDWARD THE war has made a sharp break in motor racing and perhaps for that reason there is a better chance of changes and improvements being made on a big scale when peace returns. We shall start with a clean slate, and that will give us an opportunity which would never otherwise have been given us. A few weeks ago two articles were published in The Autocar under the title of "The Fan and the Philosopher," in which a number of criticisms were made against motor racing as we know it to-day. Some of them were, I think, exaggerated for the sake of paradox, but there was something in them; for there is no doubt that, judged from the standpoint of public interest, motor racing, in this country at least, needs overhauling. It does not draw the crowds. Partly that may be due to the absence of the betting element. No one imagines that even the Derby would pull in its tens of thousands of spectators were it not for the money hanging on the issue; but in an event like the Cup Final, although the gambling element is involved, the vast majority come to watch it as a spectacle, and to cheer their own side on to victory. Can't we produce the same atmosphere in motor racing? I think we could, given certain changes. First, watching motor racing tends to be too expensive a pastime. If we want the crowds, we must arrange for prices that the crowds can pay. Secondly, motor racing is too slow. That sounds paradoxical, but what I mean is that the whole proceedings are too leisurely. In a meeting consisting of a number of short events the pauses between each are far too long. When one long race is involved there are dull periods when nothing much is really happening. Thirdly, there is the difficulty of plotting out a suitable course for modern high-speed cars which is neither so long as to make the race an occasional glimpse of a car flashing by, nor so short as to make it next door to impossible to tell what is happening or who is leading. Allied with this is the difficulty of arranging for the safety of the spectators, coupled with a good view for all of them. Fourthly, there is the difficulty of finding the requisite number of fast, modern and fairly evenly matched cars. Without this the race rapidly becomes a procession. A 20 | ||