Board track racing

[ratdaddy]

motorcycle board track

I thought this was pretty neat. Enjoy

[Rosie]

This is real neat. Back in the day, Indian constantly whooped up on Harley on the board tracks. The factory racing team was known as The Wrecking Crew. I can only imagine why.

Around that same time, one of the members of the Harley factory team was traveling with his pet pig. People started calling the team "The Hogs". It is speculated that the term "Hog" for a Harley originated there.

[waddy]

Thats cool to see that old stuff. back in the earley 70,s i owned a small motorcycle shop in myrtle beach s.c and i rented those honda 50,s to the summer vacationers, sold a few bikes and did repairs. a guy from a traveling circus show came into my shop and offerd to sell me his cycle drome it was a 8 piece portable wooden barrel thing you rode around in to put on a show. i went out and looked at it, it disasembled down to a 20ft towed trailer with everything you needed including lights steps you walked up on to the top to watch the rider in this barrel, the people would lean over the top rail and hang doller bills out over the rails and the rider would go around and slowly run up to the very top and grab the bills out of the customers hands, it was a cool deal, 1500.00 and it included 2 indian motercycles and a huge amount of parts turn key

i think the motors were 1939,s he said he was making up to 300.00 a day. he was just tired of traveling, i told i could,nt do it because i had this business to run , the bikes today would have been worth 50.000

not to mention what you could get a these motor cycle rallys these days, lost oppertunity waddy

[ratdaddy]

I had read about these board tracks being very popular in the 20's but between humidity, hurricane and snow problems it was a short lived venture. Most of the tracks ranged in length from 1.5 to 2.5 miles. Each track was made from 2x6's stood on edge and all nailed together. I am not even going to try the math on that one.

The tracks would hold automobile races on them and would normally have a intermission at the halfway mark so the track crews could go around the track and hammer down all the loose boards that may have popped up. This time would also give the drivers a chance to pick the splinters out of their hands and faces. If I come across anything else I'll link it up.