WORLD RECORD RIVALS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXIII, 5 July 1939, Page 5

WORLD RECORD RIVALS

STARE-TIME ATTEMPT TO BEAT EYSTON’S “THUNDERBOLT” While thousands gaze daily at the fastest car on earth. Captain George Eyston’s "Thunderbolt," in the British Pavilion at New Yor£ World’s Fair, a challenge is being secretly prepared by a fellow-Briton in a small engineering shop at Byfleet, in the quiet countryside of the South of England. It is the car with which John Cobb, London fur-broker and racing motorist in his spare time, will challenge the 357.5 miles per hour world record set up by Eyston in September, 1938, just 24 hours after Cobb, the first man to exceed 350 m.p.h., had beaten the previous record. Cobb told a reporter i that he believes British engineers will ultimately build a car which will enable men to travel seven fniles a *minute, 420 miles an hour, the equivalent of the distance between London and Edinburgh, in 56 minutes. The car he will take to Bonneville Salt Flats, Utah, U.S.A., next August will be a David to Eyston’s Goliath. Tt will weigh only three tons against the 64 tons of “Thunderbolt.” Many believe this makes a car dangerous to handle, but Cobb thinks that it is a small, lightweight car which will break the world’s record. The basic principle of Cobb’s challenger is a twisted singlebackbone chassis with two Napier Lion engines slung back-to-back and aslant, one engine driving the front axle, the other the rear axle. A 2,500 horsepower car, it is being “tuned” to develop an extra 300 h.p.—and with this under its bonnet Cobb, 39-years-old bachelor and genial giant of six feet two inches, expects to streak over the Salt Flats at 360 m.p.h.