LAND SPEED RECORD.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 58, Issue 36, 22 November 1937, Page 5

LAND SPEED RECORD.

CAPTAIN EYSTON’SCSAR. j HIS RACING CAREER. United Press Association—-Copyright.! NEW YORK, November 19. ! The car in which Captain G. E. T, Eyston broke the, wqrld’s . land speed record, achieving a speed'..of. ’311.42 miles an hour, is equipped with twp 12-cylinder Napier Rolls-Royce aero engines lying parallel, Captain Eyston, who has many notable speed achievements to his credit, attained 305.34 mile 9 an hour on the northward run, and on the southward run 31.7,74 miles an hour—an average of 311.42 miles an hour.

Sir Malcolm Campbell was one of the first to bo informed of Captain Eyston’s great achievement and extended to him his warm congratulations.

The previous record of 301.1 miles an hour was established by Sir Malcolm Campbell in the Bluebird at Bonneville Flats, Utah, United States, on September 3, 1935. Captain Eyston, M.C., who is a consulting engineer by profession, is 40 years of age. He has been a prominent British .racing motorist for some years, and in the last six years he has established numerous small-car speed records.

For such racing he wore an asbestos suit apd drove in a glass-covered cockpit. In his equipment he included a gas mask. When he attempted a small car record at Paris in 1931 he almost lost his life. The car caught fire, and Captain Eyston had to jump for his life. He was badly burnt and fractured a leg.